


Even If I Destroy this Tower (San Francisco, 2010)

by Elexica



Series: San Francisco, Forever [2]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: 2010 period piece, Angst, Break Up, But they get back together I promise, Childhood emotional abuse, Depressing sex, Drug Use, Dubious Consent, Eating disorders mention, Established Relationship, High Sex, Hospitals, Kaiba Seto Has Issues, Kaiba Seto Needs a Hug, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Period Piece, Recreational Drug Use, Self-Destruction, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Harm thoughts, Smut, So much angst, Suicidal Ideation, Suicidal Thoughts, Will keep updating Tags, Will update tags, and feelings, bad idea destructive sex, bad lifestyle choices, calling Seto out on his bs, childhood trauma mention, disordered eating behavior, drugs are fanfic sex pollen, drugs are going to be a part of this story, its mental illness thats what it is, mix of anime and manga canon, no actual suicide or self-harm, so far seto has done mdma / molly and adderall, will keep adding tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 20:14:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 21,644
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24032593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elexica/pseuds/Elexica
Summary: "Was I able to defeat those feelings inside me, holding me back?  Even if I destroy this tower... where do I go from here?"- Yu-Gi-Oh! Duelist, Chapter 218Seto Kaiba fits right in to San Francisco in 2010.   A 20-something CEO?  So were three other guys standing in the line at the Sightglass near the SoMa office.  He's an increasingly soulless tech billionaire?  Welcome to the club.Seto Kaiba has a quarter life crisis in 2010 San Francisco, and corresponding mental break down.
Relationships: Jounouchi Katsuya | Joey Wheeler/Kaiba Seto
Series: San Francisco, Forever [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1757809
Comments: 24
Kudos: 43





	1. Icicles

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warnings for: drug abuse, discussion (non-graphic) of childhood trauma, allusions to sexual encounters, and self-destruction. It’s a dark story, so please exercise caution.

“Icicles don't soften when they die. They sharpen into sabers and they stab you in the eye.”  
\- "Icicles," The Scary Jokes

“I don’t love you anymore.”  
It was the easiest sentence Seto had ever had to say. “I love you” had taken a million jilted false stops, endless nerves and a racing pulse. “I don’t love you anymore” did not make his heart race, didn’t increase his nausea over the baseline unrest. The tension in his shoulders didn’t heighten beyond their already tightly wound state. The tendons of neck like strings in cross bows—potential energy, potential destruction, and exactly as tight as always.

Admitting that he lacked feelings always felt so much more natural. It was easy for him -- telling people that he loathed them, that he wasn’t their friend, that he didn’t feel a single good thing... It all felt so clear, he didn't have any questions or any doubt. Hate, he thought, he knew very well. It had been taught to him from a young age. 

Things like love were too distant, too amorphous for him to understand, much less admit to.

It had taken three years of dating for Seto to stutter "I love you" out, like a coward. In bed, after sex, it was as if he was getting caught lying every time Jounouchi said “I love you” and Seto couldn’t say it back. Lying wasn’t something Seto liked to make a habit of, and it had finally gotten to the point that it felt like a truth he didn’t need to conceal for even one more minute. 

Laying in bed, naked, blissful, that was a place of vulnerability, and a place where Seto was finally able to feel, clearly, this positive feeling, without having to filter it through his competitive and fraught world view.

Which is why the opposite-- a clear determination that any such love was gone-- should be issued in a place where Seto had all of the power. Where he felt both tremendous comfort and the burden of his deepest shame. 

His dark office. His big desk. As he got older the traces of Gozaburo disappeared more and more: new coats of paint, new windows, new technology. He was toying with a new interface that wouldn’t require any solid surfaces. But the corridor remained the same, the muscle memory of walking to his own office from the elevator tainted with memories.

“Is that so?” His tall, blond boyfriend smirked from the other side of the desk. He was intimately familiar with Seto's occasional crisis of isolation.

Seto returned to his slide deck, pretending that this conversation was over, that he wasn’t dating one of the most hot-blooded, quick-to-anger men he’d ever met. 

“Yes. Why would I lie about something like that?” He kept his tone as icy as the room itself. 

“You trying to get a rise out of me?” Seto kept typing but couldn’t bear to keep his eyes locked on the screen. The blue irises left the screen to make irksome eye contact. The heat of the eye contact stirred something unidentifiable in Seto, a slight burning beneath his sternum, and he almost wanted to take back his declaration.

“You wanna break up? Is that it?” Seto almost smirked behind the monitor. He could still summon his lover’s temper.

Joey’s tone was raising, “You don’t wanna answer me?” Seto dropped his eyes down to the screen again, fingers clacking keys. “Are you really going to pretend to WORK during this?” 

Seto took a deep breath and closed his laptop. Joey was right—the anxiety of the conversation was going to make it impossible to finish the powerpoint during its pendency.

“I do not think you know me, sometimes. Not like you used to. If I’m going to be alone anyway, I might as well be honest about it.”

“Don’t know you? I know you more than you know yourself some days!” Joey was right. 

“Things aren’t the way that they used to be. Are they?” Seto brought a little more ice and cruelty into his voice. Joey wanted his full attention, right? He must remember how savage Seto’s attention is. 

“Alright.” It worked. “I’m happy to take a break. Focus on my career.” Seto stifled a mean comment in his throat. “But when you’re done with whatever your latest self-destructive bender you’re on, it’s gonna take a real nice apology present.” Joey smirked, but this time it felt bitter. Seto remembered Joey being angry, but not mean. Seto must have rubbed off on him at some point.

Seto scoffed, and that was the final straw. “I don’t need to listen to this. I’ll get some of my stuff from the house, and I’ll be anywhere but wherever the hell you are til you come to your senses. You’re always shitty around the holidays, I should have known you were thinking something messed up from how you worked through Christmas.”  
“Don’t worry about it. I’m heading to San Francisco for January.”

Joey released a breath. “Right. Mokuba’s in school there.” 

No, Seto thought, Mokuba was busy with a winter term internship at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena. Seto was desperate to keep Mokuba’s interest in explosives tied to rockets and not their late adopted-father’s business interests. Seto was actually concerned that he was presenting the Keynote for the opening day of CES on January 8. Instead, he nodded. 

Joey swallowed, which made Seto nervous too. 

“See ya when I see ya.” 

And he was gone. Maybe forever. That was what he had wanted, right? Who knows what he wanted, other than a keynote that would set the tech world on fire (again) and silence any dissent from within the company with sales. 

The air conditioning was set so low his toes were practically blue, and the tips of his fingers would be numb if they were not so constantly striking his keyboard as the tried to put together the final slide deck for CES- the Consumer Electronics Show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. Someone else, maybe a whole team of someone elses, had labored for weeks over a draft. But it was absolute trash, Seto had decided on first review. They missed the nuance of the technology, the real advancements in the core of the programming, the neatest features of the re-engineering, and of course… not one dragon. It was a trash slide deck, and now he was forced to boot up powerpoint on his own machine and do it right.

CES was a week away, and he had a keynote position again this year. Seto was hitting 25 this year, which was younger than almost any other CEO who would be in attendance, but he felt ancient. Nine years in this position made him feel redundant. Each year he just felt more on guard, more like he had to defend his position as a young, edgy, innovator, and not part of the senile establishment. 

Even though it was 8 pm in Japan, and about 4 am in California, his phone pinged with a message from Mokuba. No doubt Joey had already texted to complain of Seto’s latest bullshit. And as a freshman in college, Mokuba had become prone to 4 am study sessions. Seto often chastised him for it, but Seto’s guidance was overshadowed by the hypocrisy. 

Seto almost didn’t look at the phone, maybe it was Joey trying to talk Seto out of his lack-of-feelings, his isolation, his unwillingness to engage with his humanity in a way that could constructively manage a relationship. 

Mokuba knew better than to bother his brother on the days leading up to the show. He’d been trained, as Seto would caustically put it, not to mess around with such an important event. 

This year, at the ripe age of 19, Mokuba had determined it was time for him to do some of his own press, and Seto had graciously allowed it (under the auspices of adolescent psychologists who thought that it would be “self-actualizing” for Mokuba to do an event without his brother present). Mokuba had been invited onto a panel. As a part time KaibaCorp Vice President and a full time CalTech student, it was finally Mokubas’s turn to add something to the conversation in the high tech world.

Mokuba caught to Seto’s latest self-isolation phase before Seto himself. Mokuba had that sense—every time Seto thought he was this great incomprehensible, unpredictable force of brilliance and rage, his brother would pont out how genuinely cyclical the phases were. Mokuba could tell that the distance was killing the tiny spark of joy and trust that had sustained Seto’s relationship with Joey. Joey had been travelling on the competitive duel circuit, even stopping once during a Los Angele tournament to meet up with Mokuba and Seto was spending fully half of his time in the San Francisco office. Mokuba didn’t know that Joey had not even sandwiched in the 45-minute commuter flight up to the City to meet up with Seto, and Joey should have been able to tell that alone was a red flag.

Seto didn’t tell Mokuba that he was in the San Francisco office just to be close to his little brother, but sometimes Mokuba lied to himself, and decided it was because his brother wanted to be near CalTech, in case something bad happened. What if another kidnapper hit his dorm? Or a corporate rival breached his personal computer? But he had a bodyguard and an internship at the NASA JPL, and his brother called every night—same time whether he was in the City or Japan. His brother specialized in distant, but he kept up with his responsibilities.

At least they’d get to spend some time together at the show. Until then, Seto had planes to catch and projects to complete. 

“My world has turned so cold, but I won't cry. Cause icicles don't soften when they die. So why should I? Why should I"?”  
"Icicles," The Scary Jokes


	2. Bernal Heights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kaiba continues to self-destruct, but Mokuba intervenes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: abuse of prescription drugs (Adderall) without a prescription. It is discussed in depth. Please don't read if that would be harmful to you in any way. Here is a link to the National Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services hotline instead: https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline

My demons stay inside me; now pride and loneliness remain: my rage, my lust, my greed.  
\- “Bernal Heights,” Jahmeel. 

Seto had no problem with San Francisco. He was fond of his overly modern gated home in the Marina, across the street from the Chrissy field yacht harbor. Sure, it was darkened by fog every morning, and he was shrouded in cold mist when he took his morning brooding walk along the shoreline park in Chrissy Field. But the cool sting of the droplets on his face complimented his eternally gloomy mood. He wasn’t enamored with the yuppie runners who zoomed past him, or the constant yapping of manicured golden doodle puppies as their preoccupied owners texted or tweeted from their pre-release iPhone 4’s. Fortunately they usually popped out in the afternoons after the fog burned off, and Seto was working.

His constant attire of black turtlenecks and black pants paired with ostentatious overcoats fit right in. Sure, the folks who wear belts on their arms tended to be from other neighborhoods… but it did not matter much to the residents of the city. Even the transplants to the city were so jaded to weirdness and more focused on new technology that he could be stark naked and get the exact same amount of attention. If there was one place in the world he blended in seamlessly, it was San Francisco. He was a tech CEO? So were three other guys standing in the line at the Sightglass near the SoMa office. 

He liked the blank slate and sweeping views of the SoMa office, and his stunning corner suite especially, located just spitting distance from the SF branch of Google. But it was a Sunday, and the Californian code monkeys were unsettled by the thought of their boss in the office on a Sunday. He’d even been invited on a couple of hiking trips—one out in the Marin headlands by the VP of Marketing and one around Inspiration Point in Berkeley with a QC team. It was foggy, but not rainy, and everyone was still eager to continue their outdoor adventures. 

Seto wanted to be charmed by the openness and warmth, but instead a familiar knot grew in his stomach from the very thought of socializing. Maybe next time, he had told the staff, lying through his teeth about prior commitments. He didn’t want to get caught in the office and cause a wave of useless rumors, so he was trapped in his home office. Hiding from his own employees. 

It was already 8 p.m. on January 3, 2010, and the count down was on. Three more days. If he was going to have the demo bug-free in time to compliment the keynote on the future of virtual reality gaming, he wasn’t going to sleep. He tried not to count backwards: four days since he broke up with Joey. Four days of radio silence and stilted calls with Mokuba. Every year the little guy seemed to be less tolerant of Seto’s self-destruction and self-isolation.

He downed the little orange pill of Adderall and took a deep breath. These things-- these feelings-- that made his shoulders tense and the space towards the bottom of his ribcage ache were unimportant. He had projects to work on, big ideas to think about, and he would not tolerate any distractions—even the ones that gave his life the little meaning that it had. 

Once the formula kicked in, the hours passed in seconds, work flowing through his fingertips like electricity through circuits. The long night began to fade into day around 7:30 in the morning, but Seto had barely noticed any time had passed. He hadn’t felt any sensations, not hunger or tiredness or the unbearable twinge at his chest that had been beating against his heart since the break up—or break. He hadn’t felt the urge to check his phone. The only things that bothered him in the entire world were his slightly dry mouth (cured by sipping a San Pelegrino he kept in a minifridge in his home office) and the slight nausea that came with the electricity of the drug. He was the machine that everyone saw him as. Precise, perfect, constant, unbending, completely focused. 

He stood up, after a few hours, and was surprised that he saw stars upon rising. The light-headedness was the only sign that dinner and breakfast had passed.  
Something felt wide at the edges of his vision. Paranoia was a side-effect, he distantly remembered, but it was hard to tie that knowledge to the intense experience of eyes against him. A small price to pay for the productivity he relished in, and the slight suffering that satisfied his need to be punished. For all the things he’d ever done, and the ones he hadn’t. 

“Ahem.” Mokuba. Fuck. Even his shadow (still blessedly shorter!) sent a pang of guilt through his spine. He hadn't heard the door open or shut, but that wasn't a surprise-- he'd been completely engrossed in the project. Seto felt distinctly like he’d been caught misbehaving, even though all he’d been doing was preparing for one of the most prestigious events of his career. He also had the sensation of being the younger brother, which was new, and he hated it.

“Mokuba.” He paused. The Adderall had ruined the little social sense he’d been endowed with, and his body felt even more stiff and dissociated from his mind. He skimmed through his thoughts too slowly suddenly. Ah, he was supposed to hug his kid brother. He extended his arms sort of slowly. The touch-starved, deeply paternal part of him was delayed and suppressed by the drug.

“Really, big brother?” Could Mokuba tell he was high on something? Was this about him not mentioning being in San Francisco on his nightly calls this week? Was this about the Joey situation?

Seto withdrew his arms and defensively crossed them in front of his chest. 

“Work has been busy.” Seto decided that would cover at least half of the reasons why Mokuba was mad. 

“You can’t keep doing this to Joey. One day he isn’t going to wait and he’s not going to come back, and he’ll be right!” Mokuba put his hands on his hips.

Part of Seto was ready to go on the offensive (part of him truly always was). Seto was a handsome, brilliant, successful man, a great catch by any numerical metric, he wanted to remind his brother. But what a humiliating thing to have to say—that you are, technically, worthy of love despite flaws.

“He doesn’t need to come back. I don’t need him.” This would be a stronger position. Mokuba couldn’t tell him what he needed.

“Yes, you do!” Or perhaps he could. “Look at this.” Mokuba picked up discarded cans and walked across the room to open a front window, allowing some of the cool bay air into the room. “When was the last time you showered?”

“It’s Monday. Don’t you have school? Or the internship?” Seto bit back.

“I’m the only kid who worked through the holidays!” Mokuba gestured to the sky. “So of course, they let me take a personal day when I said I had a family thing. Honestly, they thought it was weirder when I worked on Christmas. I was the only one there—you would have loved it.” He added sarcastically. Seto frowned slightly at the comment, even though he was used to much harsher insults. Even the frown was a little delayed.

Mokuba came over and sat on the desk. Seto walked over and ruffled his brother’s hair, and only realized how cold his fingertips were when he felt the warmth of his brother. 

“I’ve only been gone for a semester, but I don’t think you’re doing great without me. So far you’ve managed to freakin emotionally torture the only person who you actually like to spend time with and honestly, you look a little bit like you’re dying right now. I think maybe I need to move home.” This is so much worse than I had thought, remained unspoken and obvious in Mokuba’s classically doughy eyes. 

“What?” was all he could muster. 

“It’s ok, it’s ok. You’ve made like a million sacrifices for me. I can do this one thing for you. There are great schools in Domino.” Seto felt completely sick now. Just so nauseous he was almost dizzy. 

“I don’t need your help.” The follow-up “I’m fine” died in his mouth. Seto was able to force out “I’ll be fine” a minute later. Mokuba fixed his stare on Seto, and Seto was crawling out of his own skin. 

Two minutes later, Seto choked out a better argument. “It’s CES. It’s a big deal. Once it’s over, I’ll figure it out.” He left the “it” ambiguous quite on purpose. “It” could mean anything. “It” could be taking the time to understand himself and actually process whatever had to be processed to properly clear up the self-destructive behaviors. Or “it” could be taking a shower and picking up his trash. He was in no rush to clarify. 

Mokuba had to know better than to expect Seto to admit to having a tough time adjusting to really, truly being alone. 

Mokuba had talked to his therapist at length about the co-dependency they’d developed through their trials, and had been very conscious in taking the steps he needed to feel comfortable and confident as a person, on his own. Enrolling at CalTech had been the culmination of years of work, thought, and effort. 

Mokuba hadn’t given himself enough credit. He’d assumed his brother would be resilient, that his brother would be fine on his own. He’d forgotten that his presence at his side was his brother’s one known weakness. The only way to bring the legendary Seto Kaiba to his knees was to take his brother away, right? That got him encased in stone and trapped in a card and at the mercy of absolutely anyone. 

“I can take care of myself.” Seto knew his eyes were more manic than he wanted them to be in this conversation.

“Look, I drove all night from Pasadena, cause I was watching the lab yesterday afternoon, and it’s almost 8 am. I need to go to sleep and I can tell you didn’t sleep. The talk is in like two days. My panel is in like four days. I’m gonna stick around til next Monday. If you can manage to just… stop whatever the hell this is… or at least cool it down by then, I’ll go back to school next Monday with my class and I’ll give it another semester. But I am so serious, Seto, I can’t lose you. And I can’t see you like this. So I’ll do whatever I have to do to fix it.”

“You can’t fix it.” Seto sat back down at his computer, and opened the damned slide deck again. “So you should just stay in school.” He washed his dry mouth with another sip of seltzer.

“Well, I plan on trying. Maybe you should try too.” And with that he returned to the hallway, scooped up his bags, and headed up the stairs to his room. 

Seto tried to type for a long time, but his thoughts were lost to ruminations over Mokuba and he eventually surrendered. He was too hyped up from the drug to sleep, so he lied down on the couch and scrolled through Duel Monsters news and making mean comments on the Ars Technica forums.

“I never really felt the weight of family on my back, I just carry myself because there is nothing I have. If there were ever moments when I felt the rhythm of life, it was as fleeting as I, plus I never look back”  
\- “Bernal Heights,” Jahmeel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: And there ya go! Some “recreational” drug use—really just non-prescription. We all know Seto could pay someone off to prescribe him stuff, but I don’t think he’d be willing to go to a therapist (on his own) even for the sole purpose of lying. I think he would think he’s too smart for anyone to analyze and that he doesn’t have any feelings anyway.  
> Hope that did not glorify drug use, that is the last thing I’d want to do. A lot of people in my life have been hurt terribly from drug use and dependence. But I think, as an expensive, self-destructive thing it would be something that an adult Seto would partake in, especially when he’s already on a streak of harmful choices. For anyone reading this, especially anyone younger, this is not healthy behavior, it’s not genuinely productive, and it’s honestly very unpleasant—unless you actually have a disorder and medication is prescribed by a physician! I hope the awful, awful sensation of having to pretend that you’re sober when you are not came through well in the narrative. Here is some more information about Adderall: https://www.drugs.com/adderall.html. If you are experiencing any of the symptoms Seto does in the fic, you should contact a physician. They may be symptoms of Serotonin sickness, which can be fatal.  
> Yes, I did look up the weather in San Francisco on January 3, 2010. No, I’m fine.  
> Also, I’ve actually started outlining the story! Wow!


	3. A Light that Never Comes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto's keynote is the only thing that goes exactly as planned.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A chapter with no trigger warnings? Wow! Yeah nothing that tough here, unless you have a fear of public speaking, I guess? There is a mention of a scar, but it is not intended to be self-inflicted.

“You don’t know me; lightning above and a fire below me. You cannot catch me, cannot hold me. You cannot stop, much less control me.”   
\- “A Light that Never Comes” Linkin Park & Steven Aoki

This is what they see: Complete darkness other than a few overeager reporter’s premature camera flashes. The impossibly wide screen flashes and from a spark the Kaiba Corp logo emerges. The camera flashes pick up. Shrouded in darkness Seto Kaiba confidently steps on to the stage. He’s wearing the dress code that Steve Jobs set (black turtleneck, jeans) embellished with his own rebellious edge: thick shiny metal plates around his wrists and forearms with large studs and belts scattered over his upper arms. The crowd does not know that the wrist plates were inspired by his need to be wearing something bullet proof, or that they guard faded scars. Instead, the reporters are only aware of the third utility: the plates reflect light, and ruin some flash photography. 

One deep breath is released over the mic, and then, calmer than he had ever said it before: “I summon blue eyes, white dragon.” And holographic blue eyes white dragons erupt from the very walls of the hall. A blue eyes ultimate dragon appears behind Seto, its triplet heads roaring in unison. His imposing silhouette is dwarfed by the holographic beast’s white scales.

“It’s one thing to tell a story.” The dragons appear to circle above the crowd, like vultures. The cameras are going wild. Seto smirks. 

“It’s another thing to live it.” The lights go up on the main stage, and Seto steps to the very edge of the stage. With all the dignity he can summon, he lifts his head and hands to the sky, directing all attention at the holograms dancing around the chandeliers.

“Welcome to the next generation of mobile hard-light projections. Each one of these dragons is projected by a piece the size of a coat button.” He pulls one, seemingly from thin air, and twirls it between his fingers. And really, there must be 50 dragons, now weaving in formation above the crows. He returns his hands to a military rest position and tilts his head slightly. “The entertainment industry has been freed.” 

Suck on that, Guitar Hero.

. . .

This is what they do not see: at 3 a.m. Seto wormed his way into the main ballroom where his keynote would be. He should have just asked someone to let him in at the concierge desk—open 24 hours—but he missed hacking, cracking, and lockpicking just a little bit. Plus, he wanted to skip any unnecessary human interaction. He was feeling more than a little wired on the anxiety, and extra antisocial.

In the darkness the room was a cave: open, empty, and mysterious. But with a slap of his hand the four light switches on the wall, the standard issue nature of the convention center was revealed. In the fluorescent lights all mystery was gone. It looked like another convention center ballroom. The walls were a bleak grey, the floor covered in maroon patterned carpeting. The chairs hadn’t even been set out, and the constant repeating reddish-brown concentric circles were a brutal eyesore. He looked at the black box of a stage, really just a plain black floor with a giant curved screen, and a “futuristic” blue desk with embedded fluorescent lights to place prototypes. 

He hadn’t been able to sleep (not a surprise these days) and Mokuba had long gone to bed. So it was just Seto, pacing through the vacant hall. He completed his first lap and headed back to the door and makes another track around the joint, dotting a mini hologram generator every twenty-or-so feet. He hopped on the stage, walked to the impossibly large screen, and placed a projector there, too. Then he walked stage left, and re-entered. “I summon Blue Eyes, White Dragon!!” He shouted, with the intensity of his dueling voice.

Nothing happened. 

He walked to the back of the stage and poked at the projector. It appeared to be functioning correctly. The indicator lights on the back were illuminated.  
He returned to the front of the stage. “I summon Blue Eyes, White Dragon!” He projected his voice but toned it down a little.

Nothing happened.

He walked back, connected his phone to the projector, and performed a micro-diagnostic. The voice recognition software was on the projector and reported that it was functioning properly.

He stalked back to the front of the stage. “I summon Blue Eyes, White Dragon,” he said, in his most standard speaking voice. The dragons emerged from the pin points of the projectors and swarmed on the hotel ballroom. Alright, he thought, I guess I’ll have to find some way to work with that.

He jumped from the stage and stalked over to the light switch. Once the room was fully darkened, he stared up at the projections. He felt like he was at an aquarium full of dragons. He stared at the projections swimming along the ceiling in the darkness, bathing him in cast off blue light.

This’ll blow that 1/3 inch thick television that Samsung was going to offer right out of the water. 

The door to the ballroom opened, and Seto looked away from the holograms. He recognized the silhouette instantly—somehow Joey was here. It was not a secret that Seto would be giving his keynote in this ballroom, and anyone who knew Seto knew he’d be overprepared, alone, and obsessive the night before the presentation.  
“If you followed me for 5,500 miles, you’re more of a lost puppy that I thought.” Seto grumbled into the darkness.

“Ah, bite me!” The voice called back in the darkness. “And for what it’s worth, it sure looks like you’re the one that’s lost!” And the door was closed again.

Part of Seto assumed that the whole interaction was part of his overactive imagination. A hallucination from sleep deprivation and bitterness. 

Part of him thought he really should go after whoever opened the door. If it was Joey, then he hadn’t given up on Seto. If it wasn’t… then someone knew about the tech he’d be presenting before the keynote, which was equally unacceptable.

But he really did not want to talk to anyone more. He wanted to stay right here, among his dragons. Maybe find some peace with them.

. . .

After the keynote, which really did involve a more detailed conversation about the specs of machinery (and only served to make the tech more impressive) and the overall direction that Kaiba Corp was going with the game industry (immersive and portable), he pressed the remote in his pocket and powered down the projectors. Someone else turned the overhead lights on. The crowd began to sift out as Kaiba gathered the mini-projectors that had created the Ultimate Dragon. Isono stood peacefully on the stage, knowing better than to try and touch the tech

“Hey!” some dork shouted from below the stage at Kaiba. Kaiba looked over reflexively. “You gonna be using that at the 2010 Duel Monsters America tournament?”

“Maybe.” Kaiba said in the gravelliest version of his voice that he could, given that he’d been talking for an hour and a half straight, with no water. He barely suppressed a cough.

“I mean… it’s literally next door.” 

Fuck. “Kay.” Kaiba responded, turning away from the man. He nodded at Isono to walk over and make it clear that it was time for everyone to go now. 

Seto was notoriously single-minded, and had famously fixated for years on Duel Monsters, dominating Japan and holding many titles before Duelist Kingdom complicated his perspective on the game. Even years later he stayed up to date with all of the relevant duel monsters’ competitions, statistics, players, cards, strategies. He certainly knew the Duel Monsters America competition would be taking place somewhere, at some time very near to CES, but in this particular downward spiral he hadn’t obsessively checked which convention center it would be held in. 

Of course his ex(?) boyfriend would be in the same city block, doing what he did best. Get third place, Seto added, spitefully, in his head. 

Mokuba wandered over from the back of the room, interrupting the tense environment. “That was excellent, Bro!” Seto smirked warmly. Just a few months and Mokuba had already started sounding like a Los Angeles native. Mokuba had already rounded up some of the mobile holo emitters, and hopped onto the stage to deposit them on the glowing table. “I know these little guys will be the highlight of all the media coverage for the whole show!” 

Seto couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief and exhaustion. “Like I said, it’s a new era for all entertainment.” He heard his voice sound oddly depressed at the statement. 

“You talk to Joey? I know he’s in town.” Mokuba had a way of striking exactly what was on Seto’s mind. 

“I didn’t realize.” Seto lied. He was pretty sure they had interacted the night before, but 3 am memories are always a bit unreliable, and Seto was too strung out to really trust his own mind.

Mokuba made a face of shock that made him look so young, Seto was half worried someone was about to kidnap him. 

Seto clearly had to beef up his answer. “I’ve been too busy to track where in the world he is. Competitive dueling at the level he’s supposed to be at is a highly international—” 

“Oh my gooooodddd,” Mokuba interrupted with a whine, “do you think I’m that stupid?”

“Of course not!” Seto was instantly offended that Mokuba would ever assume that he’d think that.

Mokuba did not have time to explain what emotional intelligence was to his brother and rolled his eyes instead.

“Look, I’ve got my own panel in a couple of days, and you should really get some rest,” he looked his brother up and down, and tried on his most serious tone, “but I’m going to make this quicker and more painless for everyone. The competition is at the Mirage, and Joey’s first duel is tomorrow morning, at 10 am in the Bermuda Ballroom.”

Seto made a classic grumbling noise, leaped from the stage, and went to pick up the rest of the holo emitters in a bit of a pout.  
“Seriously!” Mokuba shouted at him as he stalked away. “Go to sleep!”

“I know what it’s like to test fate, had my shoulders pressed with that weight, stood up strong in spite of that hate.”   
\- “A Light that Never Comes” Linkin Park & Steven Aoki

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not that anyone but me is invested in the accuracy of this period piece, but here’s my reference pics hahaha https://www.theguardian.com/technology/gallery/2010/jan/06/ces-2010-lasvegas-pictures   
> Pretty much the main reality divergence is that instead of the Qualcomm CEO, its Seto who gives the first keynote. It’s on this stage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Baj3sVg0AWQ   
> I also researched which hotels typically were and were not used by CES, and then researched the convention center space of the Mirage, and also made sure that they had it by 2010 (looks like it was updated in 2006 at least). So although I’m very conflicted on when exactly they are speaking Japanese, at least the *Mirage meeting room space names* won’t take you out of the immersive reading experience. 
> 
> Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga were there you guys. I’m extremely tempted to have Seto run into Gaga and be like “What is wrong with your hair?!” Side note: that was my favorite joke in the Abridged Bonds Beyond Time.   
> In my head canon for the story, the prequel to this is some sort of friends to lovers that starts with hatesex in a closet on the Battle City blimp and then works up to Joey moving in with Seto after DSOD. I intended for this to be DSOD compliant, and I think it is.
> 
> In my general head canon, Seto played Atem, got his ass whooped yet again and then is stuck trying to make more money so he can keep this afterlife/alternate plane of reality business open. The story can go on forever, with Seto just always trying to beat Atem and doing increasingly crazy shit (ie. Opening the Duel Academy, contacting aliens, the whole plot of GX etc.). 
> 
> But for this story: in DSOD Seto won the duel and it fixed *absolutely nothing.* He went to all that trouble, finally got exactly what he wanted and it did nothing in terms of fixing his inner life. He accomplished his one goal, was home in time for supper, and felt no better about himself.
> 
> Timeline notes: 25 in 2010, 20 in 2005, 15 in 2000 (which is about right for S1). So then Duelist Kingdom would be approximately 2001.   
> Guys I think Mokuba is going get Seto an actual dog. Would that fix things? I think it would. He’s really lonely, he’s really responsible, and he’s really bad with human emotions. 
> 
> Also yes these are supposed to be pretty much Holo Emitters. Think Star Trek: Voyager EMH.   
> OH and there is no promised update schedule on this. My job has been crazy. I’m open to anyone’s requests and stuff, but I honestly probably am going to stick to only working on this fic and related projects for a while, since I don’t want to make commitments I can’t keep.


	4. This is Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joey's perspective.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: mentions of patricide, references to disordered eating (only if you squint, not graphic), and so much angst.

“You're no good, you're no good, you could kill me and you should. I'm an idiot for thinking this was anything but blood: on the wall, on the couch, on the corner of my mouth.”

“This is Love,” Air Traffic Controller

As far as Joey could tell, Seto was stuck in a cycle. Seto killed his father over and over again. Joey tallied the times in his journal. It was a hard leather book, embossed with icons of dragons and was weighed down by a thick iron lock. It had been handmade during some creative burst by the object of his affections.

  * First, when he dethroned him from the company and felt the weight of patricide bear on his shoulders.
  * Second, when he changed KaibaCorp from the inside out—ending all munitions creations, refocusing the most incredible technology on the most ephemeral purpose: human enjoyment. Something Gozaburo simply loathed. Something Seto couldn’t taste properly anymore. Seto making items for the purpose of fun seemed more and more like a top chef without a tongue, making incredible meals he couldn't actually taste. He could design every diversion in the world, master it, and entirely fail to experience the one thing the complex creations were supposed to be able to do.
  * Third, in the middle of Battle City, as he destroyed the virtual world that Gozaburo had been uploaded to. The haunting image of his face chasing them from the explosion stuck with Joey, just as all of the other impossible things he’s seen over the years did. 
  * Fourth, when he destroyed Alcatraz after Battle City, turning the last outpost of the weapons company into more trash.
  * And fifth, now, where Kaiba continues to torture himself, becoming a cold, mean-spirited man, and then punishing himself with the hours he keeps, the food he doesn’t ingest, all the fucked up stuff he does. This serves the purpose, Joey mused, of taking up Gozaburo’s job of turning Seto’s life into a constant struggle. Just one more way to replace the man.



No wonder Seto was so frequently a moody bastard, being so trapped in his own psychology seemed exhausting. Anyway, Joey didn’t even kill his dad, not even once.

Joey was just genuinely, really trying to move on. He told himself this, even though he was enduring the out of body experience of dating an asshole who was addicted to bringing pain into his life. That was unrelated from his own experiences with his father, Joey had long ago decided. Dating someone so sad and isolated and self-destructive was not about the subtle repeating patterns of his own life.

Seto was just a strange, brilliant, sexy man, Joey announced to the journal, who occasionally understood him on an intimate level and also had many cool cars—a known sexy thing to have. Joey reassured himself that their relationship was not an exercise in reliving the daily burden of trying to save someone who had no interest in being saved or to love someone who couldn’t string that together.

The entire flight from Domino to Los Angeles was like this—Joey sitting there, writing down select thoughts and keeping others from hitting the page. He chastised himself for getting torn up about the situation at all. It was old news that Seto couldn’t handle love, and it was probably high time that Joey decided whether he could handle the heat or get out of the kitchen. But damn, some of those days he had looked into Seto’s eyes and been with someone present and vibrant and with so much to offer.

He hated that he was so morose about the whole thing, and it was made that much worse when he arrived in the terminal for LAX with only an hour layover and ran right into Anzu in line at the Starbucks.

He only noticed he hadn’t smiled in days when he saw her, and his cheeks were startled into a huge smile.

“Joey!” She reached out and hugged him so hard he felt like the breath was being squeezed out of his lungs.

“It’s good to see you, Anzu! I can’t believe you’re here!”

She continued to smile, letting the light and warmth pour out of her face. “Yeah! I’m a back-up dancer for a concert in Vegas this weekend for an electronics thing, weird I know, and Yugi’s in town for Duel America 2010. Are you going to be in the tournament too?”

“Yeah! This is gonna be my year!” Joey pushed his natural smile a little past its breaking point. “What electronics thing is going on?”

Anzu rolled her eyes. “It’s some sort of electronics expo, and I’m dancing back-up for Lady Gaga! There’s this keynote thing I think I have to go to, and a concert, but she’s also being paid to show up at some of the after parties, so we’re invited too. I’m just excited that I’ll get to see Yugi duel again. Just like old times!” She laughed. “You excited to see Seto? I know he’s not in the tournament circuit anymore, but what luck that you guys’ professional lives have synced up for a change!”

Joey’s face faded fast. This was the conference that had been driving Seto nuts the last few weeks. He’d been aware of it in years past, but had never gone, and treated it like any other business trip that Seto had to go on—wholly irrelevant to Joey’s interests.

Anzu saw the shift in Joey instantly. “What did the bastard do to you?”

“Ah its nothing I can’t handle!” Joey schooled his face into something approximating peace. “We’re just on a break, I guess.”

Anzu’s jaw dropped. “It’s not like I didn’t think you’d get smart to whatever crazy made you want to date him, it’s just…” She shook her head slightly in confusion. “It sounds kinda unresolved, which isn’t the way that either of you typically operate.”

“NEXT IN LINE” the barista shouted, and Joey motioned for Anzu to go first.

She ordered a soy latte of some sort, and then Joey ordered a Java Chip Frappuccino, and he was ready to part ways and go back to sorting out how he felt in the pages of the notebook.

“Oh no you don’t!” Anzu practically grabbed him by the shoulder. “We’re talking about this. I’m getting all the details!”

Joey shrugged, and was surprised to note how happy he was to have his friend there to help him sort out his feelings. He really had been spending too much time with Kaiba.

“You’re right. Okay, so he was super weird around the holidays, which is sorta normal for him, because he’s basically the Grinch—” He was interrupted by her peals of laughter, and smiled at his own joke and took a sip of his Frappuccino. He had to be careful, as whipped cream was piled so high it was spilling out of the lid. “And he didn’t even go visit Mokuba or anything, which I know really got to the little guy because he’s in America and they celebrate Christmas very intensely over there!”

“Oof!” Anzu encouraged him to continue.

On the connecting flight that finally took them to Las Vegas, Joey was finally able to settle in for a short nap. He had a weird dream: he was back in Seto’s office, but Seto wasn’t there. He was rifling through the papers, looking for something, and he couldn’t find it. Maybe it was a duel monsters card? For each stack of paper he filtered through, another five would appear. The whole room quickly filled with paper, all around him and even under his feet. He was trapped, in that office, being suffocated by files.

He must have made some sort of choking noise, because the passenger he got stuck next to elbowed him a little in the ribs.

He landed absolutely jet lagged and exhausted, and endeavored to get some sleep immediately.

He awoke at one in the morning, entirely unable to fall back asleep. He tossed and turned and then gave up and texted Yugi. Then Anzu. After a half an hour of silence from them, he texted Mokuba and got an instant reply. That kid was picking up some bad habits, he thought, and of course the Kaiba brothers are the only people up at this stupid time.

Mokuba knew exactly where his brother went, but hadn’t been invited to go with him, and wasn’t going to show up unwanted. Mokuba used to follow is brother’s crazy plans no matter the hour or the location. That had somewhat changed over the dimension-hopping incident, and probably just meant that Mokie was growing up.

“You can go,” the text read, “but he’s been really off for days now.” The amount of subtext that Mokuba fit into eleven words was chilling.

Joey followed his instructions all the way to the darkened hotel ballroom. He opened the door and had to suppress his awe. Dozens of holographic blue eyes white dragons were zooming along the ceiling, darting and weaving like Koi. They were the solid vision he had come to know from the duel arena, but they seemed smarter—avoiding each other and the chandeliers—and more capable of playing in three dimensional space. One dived a little low, and he thought he could even reach out and—

He saw Seto, bathed in blue and white light, looking like some sort of marble statue in a darkened museum. He looked calmer than he had been in weeks.

“If you followed me for 5,500 miles, you’re more of a lost puppy that I thought.” Seto said in his deepest voice. He sounded a little worse for wear.

“Ah, bite me!” Joey shouted back, reflexively, “And for what it’s worth, it sure looks like you’re the one that’s lost!” Joey would have spend hours staring up on the holograms, but he wasn’t going to stand there and be insulted.

Sometime after the sun rose, Joey woke up again. He texted Yugi to meet him for lunch, and they could go to the opening ceremonies together. Joey’s English was better than Yugi’s since he had lived in America for a time as a kid, and they both enjoyed that he could translate certain subtleties.

As he walked from the elevator to meet Yugi in the lobby, and was accosted by a television streaming Seto’s keynote. He stood, spellbound by Seto holding up one of the mini-projectors, discussing the technical specs. He looked better than he had any right to, Joey grumbled to himself, his eyes were shockingly vital, more alive than he had seen them in months. He was slightly radiant, though probably due as much to a make-up artist having at it as his actual enthusiasm for the tech. His match stick arms and thin fingers looked even more taught on the television, and he wondered idly if Seto had had to tighten his arm-belts recently. He noticed even the metal plates on his forearms were shifting when he moved. Maybe it was just seeing him in the CEO role that was really ill-fitting. He didn't quite look like his fire-tempered boyfriend, explaining how the new product worked in clear, concise sentences. He looked somehow older.

But his attention returned to Seto’s eyes, fierce, piercing, and completely vibrant.

Yugi fake-coughed behind him to get his attention.

“Yugi!” He smiled and hugged his friend. “How long have ya been standing there?”

Yugi grimaced a little. “Not too long” he said, instead of the truer “long enough.”

Joey looked away, and back at the keynote. “He’s doing really well, huh?”

Yugi shrugged. “Anzu told me everything, so I’m going to say that you know that he isn’t.”

Joey peeled his eyes from the speech. He couldn’t care less about the tech, but Seto had that entrancing quality to him. “Yeah. You ready to get something to eat?”

Yugi nodded and they headed out.

“Yeah, I know wrong, I know right, but I just love to pick a fight. I can sleep with one eye open if there’s any sleep at night.”

“This is Love,” Air Traffic Controller

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: it was high time that we saw things from Joey’s perspective. I was reading that Kazuki Takahashi thinks Joey is the strongest character in the series, in terms of mental and emotional strength, and I can’t say I disagree. He has his demons but he doesn’t force them on other people, and really does keep his focus on moving forward and improving. I think in some ways, any relationship with Seto is a little cyclical for him—another man with some power over him who is at times unable to overcome his vices. But I also LOVE healthy KaiJou (see eg. SF, 2020) and I want to get to that point in this fic, where they actually can face the destructive aspects of this relationship.


	5. We Can’t Stop

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto goes to a party. He doesn't like that at all. Both Anzu and Mark Zuckerberg tell him to go fuck himself. Then he takes some Molly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Seto takes Molly/MDMA at the party. I did not intend to romanticize it, but I think that it may still come off that way. If this will be harmful to you in any way, please do not read it.

“It's our party, we can do what we want. It's our party, we can say what we want. It's our party, we can love who we want. We can kiss who we want. We can screw who we want.”

\- “We Can’t Stop,” Miley Cyrus

After the adrenaline high wore off, Seto really could feel the exhaustion. Once he was in his suite—one of the penthouse selections—he could barely stand. He laid back against the couch, absently noticing how desperately the hungry and tired he was. He felt drained.

He didn’t even make it to the bed, passing out on the couch in the entryway. At some point, hours later, the setting sun hit him oddly in the face, and his phone was buzzing with notifications congratulating him for his successful keynote and inquiring about his plans. One contact who he had an upcoming transaction with messaged him with a time and place to meet up.

Seto took a shower to try and get out of his head and looked at his options for party attire. He had an image to keep up, and selected a bold black trench coat with exaggerated shoulder pads and studs over his black turtleneck and pants. He hated that he looked more depressed than edgy, and went to work strapping on his signature arm belts over the coat.

He strolled in fashionably late, having failed to properly pregame. He instantly hated being the only sober person in the club. Someone had decorated with a couple of pre-release mobile holo emitters—probably on loan from Mokuba, who had taken the vast share of PR duties as part of his expanding Vice President role. Seto quickly spotted the younger Kaiba by his wild black hair as he danced in the middle of the floor with a circle of friends. Seto thought for a second that he was too young to be there, but it was still only 9 pm, and the private party run by some of the most powerful in the tech industry was unlikely to get busted by the cops. He mourned, for just a second, that this scene represented one more thing that he had failed to shield his brother from. 

Some musician that Seto couldn’t be bothered to recognize was singing for their life on stage, but Kaiba really was here for only two purposes: (1) to conduct an exchange and (2) to get fucked up enough to not be bothered by all of the scratching and tearing going on inside of his chest. 

Within a few minutes of entry, Anzu managed to corner Seto near the bar. She was in some sort of dance uniform that was shiny and silver and skintight, and he was sure that it looked very good on her. “Anzu, how unexpected,” he said, finishing off the drink he’d been nursing.

“Seto Kaiba, you absolute bastard.”

For all the friendship speeches and standing on the sidelines, he’d forgotten what a force of nature Anzu was. To be able to stick around, no powers, no ancient-fate-bullshit, no Duel Monsters deck, just pure force of will… She was, perhaps, the most intimidating person at the conference, despite the number of NASDAQ CEOs in the place.

She explained that she had been invited as one of Lady Gaga’s back up dancers and her and her colleagues were receiving a stipend to socialize with the other party-goers. A couple of her other colleagues were working the room. At least they’re getting paid for this bullshit, Seto thought vindictively.

“I know what you’re doing with Joey.” This was news. Seto only half-knew what he was doing with Joey, other than speeding up his inevitable desertion.

He really did not want to ask a follow up question. He wanted to be out of this party, and somewhere else, somewhere more fun, with better drugs. But he had made promises to meet the heiress to a Cobalt mining magnate at this one. She’d told her father it was to discuss potential collaborations, with all of the subtext that came with that, but it was actually because she was trying to buy a rare Duel Monsters card from Kaiba directly. The resale market for Duel Monsters cards electrified him as much as any other capitalist venture, and trafficking in the cards had become something of a hobby. Plus, as Duel Monsters was poised to take increased power over society, it wouldn’t hurt to be known as a broker of such power. It also felt just a bit like he was atoning for his old tactics for collecting cards, but he didn’t think about that too much.

He reached and grabbed a bright blue drink from a passing server, leaving his empty cup in its place. If he was going to have to endure this conversation, he was determined to remember as little of it as possible.

“I know what it is. You’re a hologram.”

“I wish.” Seto smirked, pleased with his retort. His comebacks had improved since high school, he thought.

“No, you are. You’re as much an illusion as Noa was.”

“Is that so?” Seto chugged the blue drink in one go. It had been fruity, and shockingly strong.

“You reflect light, you pack a punch, people around you react to you. But really, you’re completely hollow. Just a projection of a man—as completely engineered and inauthentic as the dragons you summon.”

He laughed at that, but it came out a little maniacal, like it always did. Part of him was more offended on behalf of the dragons. “That was a rousing speech, as always. Incisive, clever, and as cruel as something I would say, but more emotional. You’re obviously perfectly successful as a dancer, but you’re not half bad at public speaking.” Another server passed, and he secured two more blue cocktails, and passed her one. “If you need a job in marketing, talk to Mokuba.” 

It was Anzu’s turn to laugh, and she accepted the drink. “See, nothing hits you at all, cause you’re not really there. I don’t know if you ever were, before everything with Yugi, maybe before everything with Gozaburo,” he visibly winced, his perfect facial control flagging from the blue curacao, “but damn… light’s on, and nobody is home.” 

She turned and took her leave, joining one of her colleagues who was chatting up some good looking guy in a Ralph Lauren polo. Seto wanted to point out that anyone that attractive was in sales and not programming or management and might as well be another ambiance model in terms of power, but he held his tongue and let her walk away. He rolled his eyes for effect, but she was too far away to appreciate his disrespect.

He stood there, fuming at the armchair psychoanalysis for a little while, until he was handed another drink. Looking up, he was pleased to see another 20-something CEO.

“Kaiba! How are you?” The pale, curly-haired brunette smiled warmly.

“Zuckerberg.” Seto nodded, accepting the drink—this time neat whisky—and sipping it.

“I heard your keynote went well.” Seto didn’t like the smugness on the other man’s face. Of course his keynote went well. He was Seto Fucking Kaiba. The tech world knelt before him.

“I heard your lawsuits went well.” Seto smirked. 

And then there was silence. Mark Zuckerberg sipped at his own drink—an appletini, Seto guessed from the decorative spiral of apple skin draped over the edge.

“Well, it really always is a pleasure to see you. Your smile lights up the room.” Seto swapped his smirk for a scowl.

“If you have an application in mind for the holo tech, feel free to give me a poke.” Seto’s scowl deepened. He hated to be reminded that his was Facebook friends with anyone. He seethed and finished off the whiskey, stalking off to deal some trading cards.

Mylena swooped over to Seto seconds after Zuckerberg had moved on, and draped a long arm around his hips. She was dressed in a skin tight sequined bodysuit and her hair was dyed bright purple. Seto flinched away from the contact instantly.

“Ah Seto, as high strung and ornery as ever,” she laughed. 

“Do you want the card or not?” Seto wanted to sound more demanding and less grumpy. He did not want to admit that he was still reeling slightly from Anzu’s stinging comments.

She laughed and pulled out wad of bills. He reached into his pocket and removed the card. This was how he preferred to carry out these transactions. Soon, he would get to leave, and find some better way to waste his own time.

They traded their respective offerings, and inspected them closely. Satisfied that neither party was going to the trouble of fucking the other over, Seto pocketed the money and Mylena placed the card into her bra, just barely hidden by the jumpsuit. She winked at Seto as she did it, and he rolled his eyes.

“Such a buzzkill,” she said, and pulled a little pill box from her purse-- an equally bedazzled thing draped over her shoulder. “You need to chill.” She extracted a little blue circular tablet with the icon of a scale embossed. It was slightly powdery to the touch. “Open wide.” The little pill was suspended between her fingertips, and she had to hold it delicately so that her inch-long acrylic nails decorated with black rhinestones didn't bite into the the tablet. 

Seto rolled his eyes again, but she leaned in and pressed the tablet to his lips. “You look like you need to feel better, Seto. I’m offering as a friend.” Seto looked away, Mylena was never a friend. Seto thought to himself that he did not have any friends.

He opened his lips just enough for her to jam the pill in. Mylena wandered off. Seto remained, holding the pill on his tongue where it dissolved slowly, and it tasted bitter. Kaiba immediately regretted not swallowing the tab whole.

He sighed inwardly and made his way back to the bar. He was feeling the four drinks pretty well, and was mentally preparing himself for whatever the molly was going to do to his brain chemistry.

From here on out it should be tonic water, he thought, so that he wouldn’t do anything he would regret.

Which was right when the one man he wasn’t supposed to do walked in.

The drug started to kick in, making his body feel warm. The room started to brighten, his body felt a bit more floaty. He felt less tethered to the world, and to reality, and to all the things that weighed on him. He felt a bit nauseous too. And a bit wired. And quite attracted to Joey.

  
"Can't you see it's we who own the night? Can't you see it's we who 'bout that life? And we can't stop And we won't stop."

\- "We Can't Stop," Miley Cyrus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N- It’s fun to write Tea/Anzu because you can do anything with her character (since dub!canon does so little) but I like to think that the truest version of her is when she’s calling Kaiba out for threatening to kill himself while dueling Yugi in duelist kingdom, and she really goes for blood in the sub. Yeah, she loves friendship, but also, she’ll cut you dooooowwwwnnn. She’s a cheerleader and a gladiator.   
>  Also her and her friends are either required or paid to attend the parties as part of the phenomenon of “ambiance models,” a particularly sexist component of the tech party scene, covered really well in this article: https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2017/12/silicon-valley-holiday-party-models.   
> Also Zuck wasn’t at CES 2010 from my research (after all, he’d been named Time’s person of the year and The Social Network came out that year) buuuuuut Facebook had gone to some of the shows, and eh it’s fanfic and he adds flavor! The CEO of Lenovo just isn’t as exciting as a counter part for Seto lol. Zuckerberg was 26 in 2010, making him pretty much the same age as Seto (weird!).   
> Is this a The Social Network crossover now? Not really, I’ve ever been terribly persuaded by the characterization of Zuck in that movie, and at the very least he’s smart enough to not act like a complete dour asshole. Also I did the research on Zuckerberg’s drink. https://www.tasteatlas.com/appletini#:~:text=Robot%2C%20and%20How%20I%20Met,cherry%20or%20an%20apple%20slice   
> And, just like the second chapter—Don’t do drugs, kids!! This is not supposed to condone drug use at all. It’s BAD that he’s doing this, and the character who’s giving it to him is ALSO BAD. Ok, off soapbox.


	6. Good in Bed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto and Joey have sex while Seto is high on molly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Although I tried my best to make Seto pretty aware, and they discuss consent, and it is affirmatively given, the molly works as traditional fanfic sex pollen. If that's going to be bad for you, please don't read. If it's something you object to, don't read.  
> They also have some pretty sad, self-destructive sex. TW for that too. Also my first foray into smut so please be gentle.
> 
> Thank you so much to Cleopatra 😍😍 for her wonderful beta reading and support! I was so nervous to post and so lucky to have her input on the chapter!

“I've been thinking it'd be better if we didn't know each other, then you go and make me feel okay. Got me thinking it'd be better if we didn't stay together, then you put your hands up on my waist…”

  * “Good in Bed,” Dua Lipa



“Oh my god. You’re high.”

Joey examined Seto’s features—his eyes placid but distant, his mouth curved in just barely the trace of a smile, looking complacent. Seto leaned in over him until Joey was fully backed against the wall, Seto pinning him there, not so much by brute force but by the strength of his presence and his arm planted into the wall for support. Seto loomed over Joey, peaceful but intense. For the first time in a while, Joey felt very close to Seto. Joey knew he looked good, and judging from the deep inhale of his partner, he smelled really good too. He was wearing a cool leather jacket and jeans that fit him really well. A few different people had offered to buy him a drink as he had meandered into the club in search of Anzu, but once he’d spotted Kaiba no force on earth could have distracted him from his mission.

Joey knew better. He knew he should refuse, he should knock some sense into his (ex?)boyfriend, he should give him a piece of his mind for all of the suffering and bullshit he’d been put through. Tell him he shouldn’t be abusing substances. Remind him of what his little brother would think. Tell him that he was losing his grip on everything.

But Seto and his long fingers and deep eyes and soft hair and the intoxicating cologne and sweat from… dancing? God, Seto really was high. Even completely fucked up, Seto was under Joey’s skin.

Suddenly, Seto’s chapped lips were all he could think about, and more on instinct than any true intent he was grasping the taller man, pulling him closer and closer until they collided. Seto leaned further in, licking and nipping at Joeys neck. Clearly Seto had enough sensibility to remember what Joey liked, Joey thought, until Seto ground his hips against Joeys, and all thoughts disappeared.

They were magnets, alternating from complete repulsion to absolute attraction.

And Seto, dazed and smiling, was perhaps the most attractive thing Joey had seen in his entire life. For once he was completely out of control, free from discipline and plans and tension. And he was roaming his hands across Joey’s back, desperately, skimming across the scars under his shirt and sucking on Joey’s exposed collarbone like it was his job.

He hadn’t felt wanted in so long. It was irresistible.

Joey let out an involuntary groan and sunk his hands into Seto’s hair. His fingertips massaged his lover’s scalp. Seto moaned into Joey’s chest, vibrating lightly from where he was working on leaving quite a mark.

Joey bucked his hips just slightly and knew his resistance wouldn’t last much longer. The club was located within his hotel anyway, all he had to do was get Kaiba into an elevator and through a couple hallways.

Even if Joey wasn’t desperate to get him back to his room—and he was—it would be irresponsible to leave Seto here, in this state. From what little information Joey’s brain could process while pressed up against the other man, he could tell Seto was very vulnerable. A lot of people would take advantage of him in this state—which was probably why Joey had never seen his man look like this before.

As Joey considered the logistics, Seto pushed up against him again, and slid his fingernails down Joey’s back. He made a soft, needy sound against Joey that electrified his whole body. 

“I need you, Joey. I always need you,” Seto whispered in his ear. “I’ve missed you.” 

Seto punctuated the last statement with a nip at Joey’s ear.

It was everything that Joey had been desperate to hear for the last week. Those few words were sexier than the heat of another body on his, the combination of soft hair and smooth skin and those cruel sharp edges of Seto’s face. Seto was whispering everything Joey had felt, in his heart, should be true. Everything he had longed to hear was in his grasp, with a mewling, desperate, horny Seto. Seto smelled the way he always did—expensive cologne, sandalwood, coffee, and something just a little bitter.

Time’s up on this club, Joey determined as Kaiba’s tongue darted out to lick at the shell of his ear. Fuck this. “Ok, Set, we gotta get you out of here.”

And Kaiba straight up purred.

With some effort, Joey withdrew the other man’s hands from under his shirt and looped and arm around Seto’s waist. He was walking perfectly fine, except for the fact that he wasn’t focusing on the world around him especially well. Still, Joey guided him out the door, and through an alley to a service entrance. Even though many of the other tech execs Joey had met in his adventures attending industry events as a plus one had been high in front of others, Joey knew Seto wouldn’t want that. 

Standing in the service elevator, Seto returned to his earlier insistence, dotting kisses along Joey’s neckline. Joey stood there, in the gross metal elevator, and had just one moment of lucid anger. He pulled Seto off his neck and held his face in his hands.

“Why does it have to be this way? Why do you have to make things so much more painful than they have to be?” Joey flashed on every time Seto made their lives harder for the sake of his own illness. From trying to bring Atem back to every time he refused to give the team a lift around California, to the circumstances surrounding their departure from Alcatraz… every time Seto could make things easier, he chose not to.

And now, leaning into him fully, saying everything that Joey had needed to hear a week ago, needing to be watched and cared for when Joey should be able to be out, getting wasted and partying with his friends, he felt a sting of resentment. 

“Why can’t ya make things hurt just a little bit less?” Joey asked, but he was really pleading for Seto to stop.

Seto looked at him, slightly dazed again, and consciously unclenched his jaw. “I don’t know,” Seto answered, quietly and distantly. And with that, they arrived at Joey’s floor, and he dragged Seto out of the elevator and into his room. His room was nowhere near as impressive as wherever Seto was staying Joey thought, but it was nice enough, with a king size bed, a television, and a desk.

Joey thought that maybe Seto would sober up in the hotel room, or that Joey would strengthen his own resolve. Was he even allowed to fuck Seto in this state?

Seto slid into the room and beelined for the bed. He sat down and got to work on his arm-belts immediately, shucking them with his classic mathematical precision. He couldn’t be all that far gone. 

“I want you.” Seto demanded, a hungry look in his eyes and a soft smile lighting up his face, throwing his jacket to the floor, and beginning to peel off his turtleneck. “Now.” That was the confidence that Joey remembered.

That line had always worked for him before with Joey, who was planted just at the door. “Are you aware enough to even…”

Seto nodded, “it’s just a marked increase in serotonin and a couple other neurotransmitters.” Seto slid his black pants off, extracting his wallet and a small tube of what Joey realized, with some frustration, was almost certainly lube. “The reactions may increase sexual attraction and…” Seto actually looked away, almost blushing, “trust.” 

Then he tore off his turtleneck, exposing the scars on his arms and the traces of others that escaped his back to stain his ribcage.

Trust.

That one word was as attractive as it was destructive.

Joey instantly hated that Seto needed a biochemical boost to be a human with him, but Joey pushed the thought from his mind. It didn’t take much effort, since Seto was already almost entirely stripped, and Joey was very distracted. It had been a while.

If this was what Seto wanted, and what he wanted… why waste the fortunate turn of events.

He out to get something besides misery from this man.

Seto was down to his underwear by the time that Joey had made it to the bed. Joey pulled Seto’s palms to Joey’s own chest. Seto about melted in his arms, hand pressed over Joey’s heartbeat. Joey’s golden eyes bore into Seto’s cerulean. “I love you,” Joey announced. “Ya absolute fucking nightmare.”

Seto took this as his cue to close the distance in an absolutely searing kiss. He opened his mouth and moaned, accepting Joey’s tongue and relishing in his taste. Seto moved his arms quickly, pulling at his lover’s shirt. Joey accepted the request and stripped it quickly. Seto looked at him with hot, pulsing lust. Just that absolute sort of fixation, that Joey thought was so unique to Seto. Seto raised one of his hands and planted it on Joey’s left hip, over a lattice of scars from a much worse night in Joey’s youth. Seto traced the scar tissue reverently, the glass shards had left something that looked a bit like a spider’s web, before moving his hand upwards to pinch at a pert nipple.

Joey had taken more than enough provocation today, and he pushed Seto back on to the bed. Seto responded with an uncharacteristically wide smile, though it was tinted with something dirty and sarcastic. Joey loved to look down at Seto when he was horny. Today he was shockingly pliant, and the view of the powerful man turned desperate for his cock was intoxicating.

Flat on his back, arms and legs splayed, Seto breathed out “Do you still want me?” in his darkest voice. The question was almost childish, but the intensity in his eyes was absolutely not.

Seto had considered it to be a valid question. The burn marks from cigars that marred his wrists were on full display. He was fairly certain he looked malnourished from the deprivation of the weeks before, and he was acutely aware how legitimately pissed Joey had been with him.

But Joey saw something completely different. He saw the long limbs, the startling blue eyes, and the man he’d been making love to as often as he could for the last three years. Nothing had changed, other than the distance in Seto’s eyes and the weakness in his grasp.

Joey answered by pouncing on top of him, grasping his wrists and pinning them above Seto’s head and looming over him. “Yeah, Seto. Always.” And he closed the distance between them.

“Prove it,” Seto said, his breath hot against Joey’s ear.

Seto arched into the warm body above him, seeking as much contact as possible between his hot skin and his lover’s.

Joey dropped Seto’s wrists and ran his hands along Seto’s side, eliciting quite a moan. Joey had been hard in the club, and although the elevator ride had caused him to lose steam, it was never too tough for the brunet to stir his arousal. 

“You’re such a mess tonight, Set.” Seto moved a hand from above his head to palm at Joey’s erection. It was Joey’s turn to moan before he removed Seto’s hand and again easily pinned it above his head. Joey ground down on the other man’s erection to replace the heat and friction.

“Shhhh, babe. I’m gonna take care of you first.” Joey whispered, leaning in to Seto’s ear. Joey felt the whole man underneath him shiver at his statement, and smirked.

Joey dropped his hands and shimmied down to tear off his partner’s boxers with his teeth.

His breath ghosted over Seto’s cock before licking a stripe down the center.

Seto moaned again at the attention, and Joey decided to take it into his mouth. Inch by inch—and Joey noted, there were several—Joey got closer to fitting the whole thing in.

The battle tower on Alcatraz had been compensating for something, but it was not Seto’s impressive length.

He sucked a few times, feeling the gentle throb of the inflamed veins against his tongue.

Joey went to deep throat him properly and found himself choking a bit on the length. 

Joey released the cock with a slight “pop” noise and leaned over.

“Where’s the lube?” Seto grunted, and jerked his head toward where Seto had placed the little tube on the nightstand. Sure enough, a fresh bottle waited on the surface.

“Ya really thought I’d give in, huh?” Joey reached over and collected the bottle, opening it deftly and tossing cap open.

Seto shrugged, before slinging an arm around Joey’s shoulders and arcing his body up to bring their chests together.

Joey teased at the entrance with one slick finger, eliciting more desperate groans. He plunged two fingers in for a slightly rushed preparation.

“Say it again.”

“What?” Seto was dazed and distracted, all of his admittedly limited attention dedicated to riding Joey’s fingers to the best of his ability. Seto’s eyes had been shut and his head knocked back in pleasure. He was trying to angle his body so that those long digits would land on the sweet spot. That Joey wasn’t already there was unusual—it was like Joey was holding out.

“Say my name. Say you want me, Seto Kaiba.”

Seto’s eyes went wide. Their renewed eye contact was electric with intensity.

“Damn it,” Seto ground harder, trying to change the angle himself, fix his partner’s targeting.

“Say it or I’m out.” Joey’s eyes were so sincere, so intense.

“I want you,” Seto spat out, “I want you to do this correctly.”

Joey withdrew his fingers and used his other arm to shove Seto’s shoulder into the mattress. Seto whined at the emptiness. 

“You know better.”

Seto sighed and looked hazily up at his lover. A smile gently returned to his face, heated with lust.

“Jou, I want you inside of me, drilling into me like its your last day on Earth.”

Although it wasn’t exactly what Joey had in mind, it sounded sufficiently enticing, and he pressed his dick into Seto’s tight entrance.

Seto almost shouted at the intensity. His arms wrapped around the blond’s hips, pulling him in further, faster, hotter. 

“Yes,” Seto whispered, getting his bearings again, and latched his chapped lips onto Joey’s neck. He had probably meant to lick, but Joey timed his trust so that it hit that special spot inside Seto at the same time, and Seto bit down on the tanned skin.

The thrusts were hard, like they used to be, full of anger and excitement and desperation. Despite his disorientation, Seto kept up. He was especially vocal, making delicious moans almost constantly.

“Hurt me.” Seto moaned out. 

“What?” Joey completely froze, dick half-in, half-out of his partner.

“I deserve it.” Seto looked Joey dead in the eyes.

Joey huffed out a noise approximating a laugh. “No.” He moved Kaiba, flipping their positions so that Kaiba was on top, which caused his cock to graze against Seto’s prostate, accidentally causing another shiver of pleasure.

Joey realized in that moment that he needed to change his strategy.

Seto couldn’t be calling the shots even a little—he was compromised. He didn’t know what was good for him. Joey had some ideas. 

“No?” Seto had grown unfamiliar with that word in recent years, especially in the bedroom.

“Nope. You deserve to be loved so slowly and thoroughly.” Joey punctuated the statement with a slow thrust upward. Seto pushed down on his dick and groaned. “And I’m gonna give it to you.”

Joey planted gentle kisses along his neck before pulling out and moving to bodily flip Seto again so that he was lying on his stomach. Joey was enjoying demonstrating how strong he was, how easily he could move the lithe frame of his boyfriend.

Seto whined at the absence, sounding desperate, “Please.”

Joey traced his hole with a finger, gently passing over the irritated area, wet with lube. “Please what?” Joey smirked.

“Fuck me.” This brought a strange look on Seto’s face, and Joey needed to kiss it away.

Joey pushed back in, pulling Seto to his knees with one arm. Joey let one hand trace the scars on Seto’s back—the perfect straight lines that had beaten the fear of failure into him so intensely. Seto hated when anyone acknowledged they were there. But Joey was going to make love to Seto so completely, accept him so completely… Joey had decided that he would screw Seto into accepting himself.

They moved in tandem for a while, and Joey was struggling to hold out. He reached around and felt Seto’s hard-on. He knew, from memory, that Seto really was terribly close—and had probably been dancing on the edge for several minutes.

With a few warm tugs, Seto came on the hotel sheets. He clenched around Joey in his orgasm, and that ecstasy cascaded through his partner, filling him from the inside.

“Fuck, Seto.” Joey pulled out, still twitching, and collapsed next to Seto.

Seto didn’t say anything.

After a few minutes of lying there in shameful silence, Joey leaned up and rose from the bed. He went to the bathroom and returned to Seto lying exactly where he’d been left.

“Set, what just happened, was that OK?” Joey asked, sitting on the side of the bed with his shirt and fresh pajama pants already on.

Seto huffed a laugh from where he was splayed on the bed. “You think you could take advantage of me?” Kaiba sneered at Joey. 

“I think, the way you’ve been goin’, just about anyone could.” Something approximating fight was building up in Seto’s throat in response, but he was too blissed out and residually high to test his luck. They looked over at the clock—it was nearing 3 am.

“Fuuuuuuu” Joey whined at the clock. “I have ta duel in seven hours and…”

Seto crawled over on the bed and laid his head in Joey’s lap, teeth still involuntarily clenched. 

“Do you wanna talk?” Joey looked down at Seto’s head. He might be getting a little more sober, Joey thought, or maybe it was just wishful thinking. Seto closed his eyes and Joey sank one of his hands into Seto’s hair. “I wanna talk. I guess you’ll tell me if you don’t wanna listen.”

Seto’s chest rose and fell with his steady breathing, he looked almost asleep. Or comatose.

“I miss you, ya bastard.” Joey couldn’t tell if his mouth was about to break into a smile or if the pressure in his chest was going to erupt into tears. “I miss the person you can be, the man who fought alongside me with dragons, the man who raised Mokuba on his own, the man who showed the that I could feel worthy all on my own…”

Seto purred. His eyes were closed, he looked somehow peaceful and exhausted at the same time.

“I miss the sex. But not the crazy sex, which runs contrary to everything I’ve been told. They tell you the crazy ones are the best but with you… Yer such a remarkable man, that when you really dedicate all of that focus and fucking… genius… to making love… God, I miss quickies on airplanes and locker rooms but I really miss our bedroom, our bathroom, the media room…”

Seto’s eyes flashed open, and looked sort of understanding, but Joey wasn’t quite sure how present he really was.

“I don’t even know if yer still fucked up, I think ya might be dazed from whatever you put yourself through this week. And whatever the hell you took at the club.” 

Seto’s head shifted a bit, Joey decided he’d rule it a nod.

“I miss you being really pissed at people, and pissed at me. I miss you calling me out for doin’ something dumb, I miss you being in the right. You haven’t been right about almost anything lately.”

Seto made a grumbly noise. Even in his sort of daze he seemed to recognize an insult.

“I wonder, were you trying to use me to hurt yourself?”

Seto didn’t respond. He laid there, quietly, as far away as he had been when Joey was in Japan and Seto was in California.

After about ten more minutes of Joey absently carding his fingers through Seto’s hair, Seto stirred a little.

“Jou, I’m so tired.”

They were silent again for a long time after that confession. Weakness, from Seto Kaiba, even after everything, still felt disorienting.

“I don’t know how long I can do this for. I used to think I could do it forever.” Seto whispered. “When I was 15, I could do everything and more. I thought I could do everything forever.”

Seto wasn’t looking in Joey’s eyes. He wasn’t looking at anything at all. Just staring, haunted, into the middle distance. He was lost somewhere between the top of Joey’s hair and the ceiling.

“I’m the ashes of the man I used to be.”

The exaggerated bags under his eyes were rotting into his face. Joey knew he always looked tired, but it was finally wearing on him in earnest.

“I keep running but there’s nothing left inside of me. And everyone is gone.”

“Set,” He looked down and stared into the blue eyes.

“I fought for every day of my life and there’s nothing left to fight for. Mokuba doesn’t need me.”

“Hey!”

“You don’t need me.”

“HEY!”

“I defeated Atem. I bought Pegasus’ company. I crushed the von Schroeders. I killed Gozaburo. What’s left? Is there no more vengeance for me?”

Joey stopped moving his hands and held Seto’s head very carefully with the pads of his fingertips. “There’s no point, all I do is make new duel disks. I don’t even use them to kick your ass anymore.”

It was Joey’s turn to be quiet for a long time. He finally said, “Maybe you need to live for something besides, uh, vengeance. Have you ever tried to be satisfied?”

“Nights with you were closest I ever got,” Seto looked away, engaged again but desperate not to meet his eyes, “and we both know those are running out.”

Seto maneuvered out of Joey’s lap and back to the left side of the bed, which was customarily his. Joey got up and brought Seto a glass of water and put it on the nightstand.

“It doesn’t have to be like that,” Joey said to the curled form of his partner. “You crossed a line, but I know you can change. Yer stronger than whatever’s eating ya!” He smiled when Seto met his glace and grabbed the water cup.

“The only thing left is me.”

“It's bad, we drive each other mad, it might be kinda sad, but I think that's what makes us good in bed…”

  * Good in Bed, Dua Lipa



**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n – Whoops its dubcon but I tried to make it really close. ALSO the story is really actually outlined and it will be a total of 10 chapters! Cheers! That means I’m more than halfway through, and you, dear reader, will not be subjected to too much more of this depressing ass story.  
> Also I’ve never done molly but I read some articles on it, hopefully its accurate enough if any party people read this fic. I’m pretty sure molly is different from fanfic sex pollen, but by and large they’re the same in this fic haha  
> Source: https://www.drugabuse.gov/publications/drugfacts/mdma-ecstasymolly  
> Was it angsty enough for ya! Damn!  
> Ahhhh Also I should explain the names—Joey in this story grew up until he was 8 in the US and has a name he uses in America—Joey Wheeler—and a name he goes by in Japan – Jounouchi Katsuya. So Seto calls him Jou, and everyone in the US calls him Joey, and also Joey is much easier to type than Jounouchi.  
> The alternative song for this chapter was Hot Mess by Cobra Starship but I suspect that Dua Lipa is cooler these days.


	7. My Friends Over You

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The day after.

“There’s no room, left here on my back for you, it was damaged long ago. Though you swear that you are true, I'd still pick my friends over you.”

  * “My Friends Over You,” New Found Glory



“We missed you last night,” Anzu said over breakfast. She was lounging in a teal velvet tracksuit and tan Uggs. “What kept you from the club? A certain CEO who finally figured his shit out?” She prompted with a quirk of the lip. “Maybe you should borrow some of his turtlenecks, he clearly got a few hickeys in.”

Joey pulled at his jean jacket collar, moving it to try and cover his heavily marked neck. Sensing its complete futility, he planted his head flat on the table. “Yes, I ran inta him before I found you. I needed to… he was rolling, and I just took him back ta my room.” He spoke against the wood grain. “We… he can’t keep doing this sorta manipulative shit.”

Joey couldn’t see his friend’s reaction, but he could feel the disappointment. They had hoped that the relationship would turn a new leaf for both men, but this constant rollercoaster of self-destruction wasn’t working in their eyes.

“Seriously.” Yugi affirmed. “It’s not healthy for you.”

“It really ain’t,” Joey mumbled into the table, heart sinking. He could hear Anzu hum her agreement with Yugi. A comforting hand was placed on his shoulder. “I must be so stupid to keep giving him second chances,” Joey added.

“You’re really not. It’s who you are! You just can’t stand to give up. Even when sometimes you really should.” Anzu said.

“I told him he crossed a line though, and that if he doesn’t shape up, it’s really over… God I sound so pathetic.” I sound like I used to, Joey also thought, but did not say.

“It’s not pathetic—” Anzu started, but Yugi cut her off.

“It’s love, it’ll be what it’ll be. We’ll be here no matter what.” Yugi said, with more force than either Anzu or Joey had anticipated. “Come on, let’s duel!”

Together they hauled Joey up from his sad posture and they walked toward the next event.

The duel itself was a familiar match-up—a tough early round pick against Leon von Schroeder. With a few lucky dice rolls, Joey had clinched the win. Despite the distractions and his lack of sleep the night before, Joey’s dueling was always fun to watch, and the crowd easily became invested.

After the duel Joey received a Blackberry Messenger note from Seto “Not a tough duel. My critiques of your deck still stand. You did well. Have to get back to work earlier than anticipated.” 

“Please don’t go.” Joey wanted to text back. “Please don’t let me go.” He wanted to plead over the phone. But he decided to answer with silence instead. 

“Fuck him!” Anzu had said over his shoulder, reading his texts. “No, wait, I mean stop fucking him.” Joey rolled his eyes. This was no time to joke, he wanted to say. But he also felt a bit like he deserved to get a little hell. He was supposed to have more self-control than this.

The rest of the day passed peacefully, in a familiar mirage of dueling, cheering, and chatting. Joey was slated to participate in the quarter finals the next day on account of his excellent performance.

Joey finally caught up with Mokuba at dinner.

“Set said he’s headed home early with a business emergency?” Joey asked, not bothering with preamble. 

“Yeah. He’s going to miss my panel.” Joey placed a hand on Mokuba’s shoulder.

“That’s not like him at all. He’s a lot of things, but a bad brother isn’t one of them.” Joey looked off.

Mokuba looked up, “I know. Something really is wrong. I think he’s taking advantage of my panel to get away with… I don’t even want to know. He was supposed to use this week to prove that I could trust him to take care of himself while I went to school in Los Angeles.”

The two men studiously looked away from each other. “He wasn’t doing well when I saw him.”

“I heard.” Mokuba snapped back. “And I can see,” Mokuba’s eyes raked over Joey’s marked neck, “You were supposed to help me take care of him.”

Joey’s retort that he did take care of him died in his throat. It was too cruel, too sensual, too true. He sighed instead. He wanted to tell Mouba that he shouldn’t be responsible for another grown man, like Anzu had told him. But Joey was self-aware enough to know he was preaching to the choir. Joey settled on honesty and said only, “I don’t know that I’m strong enough to do this.”

Mokuba’s shoulders offered a measured shrug. It was not convincing. He looked anything but indifferent. “No one is. It’s hard to watch. It was different when we were on the same side. But now, I don’t think he really has a side. Anyway, I’m staying here for my panel. Representing Kaiba Corp and all that. And you have the rest of the tournament. He wants to be alone? He can do it.” Mokuba sounded bitter. 

Mokuba gathered his breath, but sounded manic when he continued, his voice higher from the tension in his chest. “He’ll go off when he wants to. I’m old enough. I don’t need a dad anymore, or a big brother.” Those last words were too much and Mokuba broke down, crying softly.

“That’s not true.” Joey reached an arm around Mokuba’s shoulders and pulled him into a hug. “I’m not giving up. I never do. We’ll get him back.”

Mokuba continued to cry. The weight of his tears was heavy on Joey’s shoulders, and he thought for a second, that he could only imagine the strength Seto had to protect this kid. He thought also, with some bitterness, that it was cruel and fundamentally incorrect that Seto wouldn’t be fulfilled, when he had so much love waiting for him.

“You were everything I wanted, but I just can't finish what I've started.” 

\- “My Friends Over You,” New Found Glory

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah this chapter is a lot weaker but the plot must move forward! The rest of the fic is almost done <3


	8. I Can’t Carry This Anymore

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto can't focus because he is having a mental breakdown in his office.
> 
> TW: suicidal ideation!!!, childhood emotional abuse, alcohol (minor), self-harm ideation!! These are present, and if you do not want to read that, please turn away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: The classic fanfic term for this is a vent fic. I’m going through it, and I’ll be ok, just gotta internally torture Kaiba a bit. By the end of the fic, he’ll be ok too. So anyway, a lot of this is self-indulgent angst. If you’re seeking that, welcome! If not, you may wish to skip. I mean the whole story is self-indulgent angst, but this is probably the worst of it. I promise things will be better for our boys next chapter.

“I can't carry this anymore. Heavy from the hurt inside my veins, I can't carry this anymore.”

  * “I Can’t Carry This Anymore” by Anson Seabra



This was what failure felt like, Seto thought, sitting hunched over his desk, feeling a searing pain in his chest. He had become absolutely fucking buried in expiring contracts and late engineering reports. The new product announcement at CES was supposed to usher in a new wave of sales.

The orders had followed his lead, but due to his own negligence, his own weakness, the production line was stalled. Failure, delay, incompetence: the things he dreaded more than death.

This was how failure felt: sinking, suffocating, tearing. He looked at the empty documents, the PDF’s begging for his review, and he thought for a second maybe he could slice open his chest and let his blood nourish the words.

Let the blood ooze from his chest and drip through the pages, gush over the word-processed pixels and turn them into something better. Let the blood complete what his brain was failing to finish.

Maybe his blood would finally be the thing that satisfied everyone who had been so hungry for Kaiba Corp. Maybe he could give those vampires that precious liquid, surrender to the beasts that would feed on everything that he had created. 

Maybe it would make him feel free. Maybe it would satisfy him. Maybe his own blood lust, directed inward, would be the thing that finally completed the task that so many had failed to do. No one could bring Seto down, except himself.

He looked at the window. He had seen Gozaburo fall out of an identical pane of glass a thousand times in his mind’s eye, in his nightmares, his flashbacks. 

And he had contemplated what it would feel like for him. Would it be different in San Francisco? Or just like Domino? The effect surely would be the same.

Those thousands of feet through the mist and fog of the City, the cold air rushing past your face, and compete freedom from everything that the world had taken from you. Expected of you. Demanded. 

Just crushing silence, the force of gravity doing what so many others had tried to do with bullets and schemes. 

He shook himself from the reverie—it was a waste of time, burning precious seconds. Somehow, he needed to go back in time, back when all of his hate was a fuel and not a distraction. He needed to return to that place where all of his vices, all his demons, were propelling him forward instead of stalling him.

He had seen so much of reincarnation, though he wasn’t sure what to believe. Maybe his next life he would come back as a being that could know inner peace, who would not be drowned, daily, by his own failures. Maybe the next round of Seto or Seth would not struggle to stay alive, maybe he would be valued for something besides those the meek offerings of effort he managed to deliver in the form of workable products and sales.

Perhaps he would die and awaken as Priest Seth, like a constant cycle. A soul in the washing machine, tumbling over and over between doomed boys. Always the same pattern: a rival to hate his father, to kill him or at least to be involved in his death, to be without hope but full to the brim with competence and skill. All that determination and nowhere to go. A ceiling on the possible accomplishments, placed there by someone who was chosen to be better than him for reasons beyond comprehension. A good Pharaoh, a competent Pharaoh, but not the legendary King. A brilliant CEO but never the King of Games. Just a very effective leader.

Who did the choosing? Seto couldn’t linger on such nonsense, when he was already late in solving those pipeline problems. Maybe he should have done more than sell Mylena the card. Maybe he should have thought harder about what he needed to do. Put in the work like he used to.

And every second he thought of his past was more and more of a waste of his time. Like the pills. Like Jou. Everything was sucking up that precious ethereal time and chugging it, swallowing all of his seconds and all of his future, and taking away from him that force he once had. Leaving him out of control, a slave to his own past decisions and his own present weakness.

Now his crushing memories were like dead weights in his pockets, dragging him to the sea floor.

He remembered being 10 and sitting in his “father’s” office.

He remembered how his legs would swing under the chair, never hitting the ground. He hadn’t been perky, but he had been listening. He always listened so well.

One day Gozaburo leaned over that god-awful oak desk. He’d been describing some aspect of the government contracts infrastructure to Seto, in terrible detail, and Seto had uncharacteristically gotten a little bit lost. He was trying, he was trying so, so hard but it wasn’t there. Some of the foundation was missing, some lesson glossed over or skipped in haste.

And Gozaburo leaned over, noticing the distance in Kaiba’s eyes. 

And he said, “Alright, _son_ , we’re doing a different lesson today, since you are too feeble-minded to retain this one. Seto, do you know the word ‘Resentment?’”

And Seto looked back at him with those big baby blue eyes and said “no.”

And Gozaburo leaned back over, and the smell of tobacco and man’s sweat inundated Seto.

“Someday, you will learn. I resent you, Seto. You live here, and you walk this Earth, and you call yourself my son, but I resent you.”

Seto would later look up the word in a fat dictionary kept in the library where he all but lived. And instantly, he understood. It stung, but it also clarified the situation.

“A feeling of indignant displeasure or persistent ill will at something regarded as a wrong, insult, or injury.”

He was wrong. Something about him was wrong. All of the things about him were wrong. He did this. He demanded to play the game, demanded to be taken in. It was his fault. His greed was too great for a ten-year-old. His heart too full of avarice. 

His desire to cheat, to lie, to scheme, it was all wrong in a child. And now he would pay for it.

These memories replayed more and more often. Without the distraction of evil chasing him, without people trying to steal his company or alter the afterlife, without the focus and adrenaline that he could direct at that next task, that next goal, that next person of pharaoh to beat, that was it.

There was nothing to keep him from the memories like sandbags tied to his legs, pulling him deeper and deeper into that fundamental question.

What was it, so rotten and vile and fundamentally broken that destroyed any semblance of good feelings within him, directed toward him? Why was his soul like a mold, seeping into other healthy entities and decaying them? Turing sustenance into poison. Was he merely born wrong, sinister, vile, cruel?

It didn’t matter, he used to think, the only thing that mattered was that next step in the program, the next stop of the train, Mokuba getting everything he needed, Seto not having to go to sleep hungry. And of course, never failing. Defeating all who stood before him. Being the best, at any cost. Human lives would be ended before Seto was forced to bear final, absolute loss. 

And now, there was everything in his grasp, but it felt like nothing. The only difference between this prison and the one that Gozaburo had built was that Seto picked out the wallpaper and carpeting. It was the same miserable existence.

He was not some washed up child prodigy. He lived up to every speck of his potential. He set the world on fire every damn year. He made things. He used his talents and he generated marketable products for ethical causes. He had a boyfriend who was independent and successful in the one fucking hobby he was passionate about and a brother who he raised who is excelling in his own field.

He used his brain; he used every damn ounce of genius he had. But what had he done? Worked himself out of one hell and into the next. 

He didn’t expect that there could be so many layers of hell, that the world would have so many ways to take what he had and torture him.

And then what happens, what happens every time, is that the experience ends for everyone else. The event is over. Everyone else can move on but him. 

He blows islands into oblivion, he builds time/dimension machines to defeat ancient myths, he raises and burns companies. But there he is, stuck in the past, like a bird tied to a rock…

Like a dragon, rotting from the inside out on the roof of a cursed castle.

Seto remembered how it felt, being turned to stone in that virtual world. Reaching out and being frozen in concrete. It was not cold, not hot, just still. He must have struggled, that was the kind of man he was, but it must have been so ineffective he couldn’t feel it. Just trapped, stilled, frozen. 

That feeling never left him. It had not started in the concrete, and it would never end.

He left the unfinished worksheets and walked over to his decanter. It was a pretty crystal quartz thing, with dragons engraved into the rock, a gift from Pegasus upon the mutually beneficial absorption of Industrial Illusions to Kaiba Corp a couple of years back. It was filled with a Japanese Whiskey, Yamazaki Mizunara aged 18 years, which could be found in San Francisco if you were willing to look hard enough and pay out enough. And he was. 

The burning that licked down his throat reminded him that he was vital, he was alive. His heart still beat, blood still throbbed in his veins, and under the whitened lines across his back.

It seemed tremendously wrong, that he could feel so much pain, and yet there were no physical manifestations anymore. He was used to suffering and bleeding with his inner pain. Fighting, screaming, releasing that anger, rage, hate, terror. But now, everything appeared so healed, all patched up, mended by fresh collagen, leaving only a trace marker of what had happened before. 

He poured the next glass of whiskey lazily, letting the bottle linger over his glass for too long, letting too much of the amber liquid pool.

He downed most of it in a few angry gulps, the echoes of fire slicing at his stomach, turning his gums numb. It hit him in the knees too, alongside the other deprivations that ate away at his strength. That feeling, a weakness in the back of his knees was familiar. He remembered it from when he’d been at Gozaburo’s funeral. The sensation was paired with a sort of surface level chest pain on the outside of his sternum. It was either sadness or shock or distress, he reasoned. He hadn’t noticed that he’d felt anything at the death of his legal guardian at the time, but he remembered the intensity of those physical sensations: the knees, the bones of his torso. He remembered his own reflection in that ominous fucking casket. 

If only Seto had been in charge of the funeral. He would have had the man incinerated.

The boy in the reflection of the onyx box had so much ambition pounding in his veins that it dragged bile up his throat. Now, only shame and failure seemed to do that trick. And whiskey.

Pointless and painful. His life had been a constant struggle, but there had been goal posts. He poured another glass with slightly trembling hands. It felt unbearably heavy. He sipped at it weakly.

Now there was nothing. Nothing to aim for, nothing left to fight for. The glass was half empty, and his tossed it at his reflection in the window. It created a hairline fracture in the window, and the crystal shattered on the ground, leaking expensive whiskey on the cold marble floor of his office.

“I know I'll be fine, it's just that every time this comes back. Tell my maker up above that I have had enough.”

\- “I Can’t Carry This Anymore” by Anson Seabra

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I am mixing anime and manga canon. I am sorry if it is confusing, I just want to play with as much of ygo:dm as I can….  
> Also man…. I just love fanfics where Seto throws a glass of whiskey at the mirror. I’d read them all day every day and I can’t explain why. So here he is, throwing some at the mirror. I’m sure it won’t be the last time I write this trope.


	9. Cotton Candy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seto finally passes out at a press conference.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: hospitals, fighting siblings, referenced disordered eating (not dissected).

“Let these leaves fall on the ground. Let my demons finally drown. Let my body turn to stone.”

  * “Cotton Candy” by McCafferty



Mental breakdowns are often hard to hide. Perhaps that is exactly what makes it a mental breakdown—the end of the boundary between the private, hidden, internal state and the actual visibility of the mental struggles.

While it had been visible to everyone in his life for about a month, actually passing out at a press conference was a most unwelcome place for a final breaking point. 

For some of his life, the only thing that Seto had truly possessed was his own body. The sinews and neurons were all that he could call his own. He pushed every particle of himself to the breaking point so regularly, and it had never failed him before. Not like this.

He decided, in a moment of lucidity, strapped to the stretcher, that he hated being twenty-five. This was supposed to be his prime, the beginning of his adult life, but he felt distinctly that he’d already peaked. The ringing of wheels on hospital linoleum clogged his ears. He stared at the ceiling as the overhead lights flashed past. He was losing it.

Like wet sand through an open hand at the shoreline, everything he’d fought for his entire life was draining through the gaps in his fingers. Soon there would finally be nothing left. 

Seto faded back out to a restful oblivion.

Seto awoke to the beeping of hospital monitors. He stared at that godforsaken white ceiling with those punched in tiles, punctuated with those ominous fluorescent lights. He was certain he hadn’t been out long because no one was there. Subconsciously, he must have known that his isolation was a self-fulfilling prophecy. You aren’t allowed to push everyone away and then wonder where they went.

Still, his loneliness was a timer. No doctors meant that the emergency must have passed. No Mokuba meant that he had been out less than four hours. It was only a two-hour flight from Pasadena to the private Santa Clara airport. If there was traffic, his brother would take a helicopter to the hospital.

He was not sure how he had arrived in the ward. He remembered, flashing lights from a press conference. He remembered being dizzy upon standing. He remembered gripping the podium, those pale knuckles bulging out, as if trying to escape his skin. He remembered that pain in his chest, his stomach, his arms. He felt sore everywhere, but he’d been feeling that way for so long. 

That physical sensation must have meant something in terms of emotion, but the aches of his own past, his own guilt, shame, loathing, felt so undeniably identical to those of hunger and tiredness. Compiled it was one bad feeling that he could actually tolerate, a suffering that he had been maintaining to distract from sorting through sensations. All in all, it was reckless behavior. Stupid too. Why did he always need to test fate? And test himself?

He closed his eyes again, the IV giving him the electrolytes that he’d been stealing from himself, and beeping of his own functions slowing to a calming rhythm.

He woke up next with his brother next to him.

He hated that sensation that crept over him once more—that he was the younger brother, the one that needed the nurturing, protecting, care-taking. He’d been the provider for so long, and it ate away at the shreds of his dignity to have Mokuba look at him with pity and worry.

“I’m going to be packing up my dorm room this week, finishing the last part of my internships, and withdrawing from my classes. If I could get someone else to do it, I would, but those are my commitments, Seto.” He said “Seto” with scorn, the way Jou used to say “Kaiba.” 

Seto’s eyes were open, but he kept his mouth glued shut in his classic scowl. It didn’t feel as powerful or disdainful as it used to. It felt more like he was a pouting child.

“All you need to do is rest for now. I’ll make sure that you’re ok. We’ll move back to Domino, back to the manor, whatever it takes for you to be yourself again.” Mokuba placed a hand on his brother’s clothed shoulder. Mokuba could feel the joint where the arm and clavicle met through the fabric and skin.

“For the week while I’m finalizing my affairs, Joey’s gonna watch you. Don’t ask if you deserve it, the jury’s out on that one, but he volunteered because he loves you and there’s no one else.” Seto did not doubt that it was a point of contention within the group chat. Their relationship always was. 

When did Mokuba get so old? So icy? Seto wondered. This is my fault. He thought distantly, simply. Seto’s brain wasn’t running as fast as usually, the thoughts slowed and viscous, like molasses oozing through his head. 

Seto tried to pry his lips open, cough out a complaint that they could hire a nurse. That he was fine, but at least if he wasn’t, then wouldn’t an actual medical professional be the right call? But he was fine, obviously. 

But he felt weak. He felt tired. Those achingly slow thoughts left slimy snail trails through his brain. The burning in his chest, that anger that lit up from deep within the marrow of his bones, it wasn’t strong enough to pull him up and out, not like it used to be. He closed his eyes and leaned his head to the side.

“I don’t want this for you.” Seto managed to whisper, after a time. “I want you to be free.” Seto wasn’t sure if he managed to say those words, or only think them.

“Too bad. If you wanted to be that alone, you should have left me at the orphanage. Let Gozaburo send me away. Left me in Pegasus’ dungeon. Stayed with the Pharaoh. It’s too late for you to leave me now. We’re in this together.” The warm words were said in a cold manner, like a negotiation position with a stranger. Mokuba looked as if he was about to punctuate his answer with a dramatic walk out of the room. But he wasn’t Seto, he had no desire to make this worse than it had to be.

“Do you want to know what the doctor thinks happened?”

Seto shrugged. It was noncommittal, which wasn’t in his nature, but he felt lost and disoriented, and he didn’t have to prove anything to Mokuba. His shoulders weren’t terribly effective at the moment anyway, and the jerk could have been mistaken for a muscle spasm. 

“He thinks that you had low electrolytes. Something related to not eating enough, maybe not sleeping enough. Possibly throwing up, though that’s… I don’t think that happened. Anyway, you’re kinda sick but you’re being really overdramatic. What you need is to take care of yourself. Like, it looks bad, you look bad, but it really was just exhaustion. You… you haven’t really done anything permanent. Yet. He said that this is just…” Mokuba looked away, “It’s just a cry for help.”

Seto didn’t think he had the ability to convert that pain and rage into energy anymore, but there it was, and everything that had been weak and sluggish within him was awakened and revitalized.

“A cry for help?!” Seto shouted. His voice was hoarse but the vitriol was present, like always. “I don’t need any help, from anyone.” He hated how small it made it seem. This torture, inside and outside had felt so scalding so mature, so purposeful, how could anyone see it as anything other than his perfect masculine self-effacing, self-flagellating torture. 

A cry for help? What a childish, weak thing for the manifestation of his inner torment to be.

He smashes the world, he brings the industries to their knees, he crushes his adversaries and he does it in style.

So he had a mental breakdown. It is already over, because he has decided it is over. Doesn’t mean he needs help. It means he needs to get stronger, pull all of that pain out and flip it to a new purpose, sharper, crueler, quicker, more sophisticated. Like always. 

His wild eyes said more that his throat could articulate.

“I’m not here to fight with you.” Mokuba said.

“What are you here for?” Kaiba snarled.

“Because you are my older brother. I love you unconditionally.”

Seto knew that his brother loved him, but it was hard for him to see it as anything but transactional—his money, his effort, his sacrifice had been exchanged for the affection and continued support of his brother. Everything in Seto’s world was transactional. At least, it was supposed to be.

Why did Seto care? He was allowed to love his brother unconditionally. But accepting the inverse felt terribly wrong. Shameful. Weak. 

Seto just lay there. Paralyzed by his own feelings, which weighed liked an anvil placed on his chest, grinding him into the scratchy hospital sheets. Undignified. 

“We can go home in a few hours, if you promise to take it easy, y’know, eat and sleep.”

Seto nodded.

“And exhaustion isn’t exactly shocking. I think we’ll have the PR Team just say it like it is. Plus, then we don’t have to worry about medical records being leaked.”

Seto looked at Mokuba again, studying him.

“Oh, yeah I had them destroy the tox screen. I talked to Joey. There’s no record of any of it.”

Seto looked down, satisfied but ashamed.

“You gotta get it together, big bro. This isn’t sustainable. You can’t live like this forever.”

Seto closed his eyes.

“I didn’t expect to make it this long.” Seto said.

“Yeah well, I expect a lot longer. ” Mokuba said.

. . .

“Tell me something other than what I've been facing. I'm so lovely at making destructive decisions.”

\- “Cotton Candy” by McCafferty

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I just keep putting out this angst. Maybe when it's out in the world it will evaporate and we can all move forward. 
> 
> Thanks, by the way, for reading my therapy fanfiction. You didn’t have to do that, but it does make me feel less alone. So… thanks. 
> 
> There are going to be more than 10 chapters. Whoops!


	10. Brother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More sad Mokuba.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More tacky emo nonsense, my fellow angst seekers. I brought Gerard Way into this because quarantine made me 15 again. 

“And brother, if you have the chance to pick me up, and can I sleep on your couch to the pound of the ache and pain?”

  * “Brother” by Gerard Way



30,000 feet up, Mokuba’s nightmare was becoming real, and all he could do was wonder. What finally overtook his brother?

Was it a bad mixture of nootropics and sleep deprivation? Was it narcotics and food deprivation? Was it some sort of strange out pouring of an old wound, a reopened slice through his chest, an act of ritual bloodletting? Was it some tepid version of suicide?

WIRED’s website had some theories sprouting up in the twenty minutes since the news broke. The tech reporter’s best guesses were related to microdosing shrooms and eating only pre-market beta-Soylent. Other blogs had less charitable takes, many featuring an addiction of some sort, frequently cocaine. It was trending among Twitter’s 30 million users.

Mokuba had seen it coming. Like some sort of hyper-specific Cassandra, he knew that something very bad was coming. Like a meteorologist studying the inscrutable sky for some prediction of what force to prepare for, Mokuba had observed the signs diligently. When he’d packed his bags for his college dorm, last August, he felt the portentous energy hugging him. When his brother had rented a house in California, he knew something was unwell, perturbed. Mokuba had tried to attend to it—head it off with warnings, monitoring the situation… hell, he had dropped everything to fight it, but somehow it was not enough. It was never enough. Mokuba knew that some forces were too powerful for any mortal to interfere with, and his brother’s more insane moods fell into that quadrant. 

The passage of time seemed to wear harder on his brother than either of them had expected.

. . .

Seto dozed off, into an angry and uneasy sleep, the sort that left him tossing and turning. He hadn’t meant for anything to pan out this way. He was exhausted in the most clinical sense of the word—but the effects of the IV were simultaneously invigorating and instructive. 

The sleep you get at the hospital is never deep, Seto had accepted after a few bad nights in his youth, and today’s nap was no exception.

He awoke to the sound of Mokuba talking to him as if he was in a coma. He decided to keep his eyes closed, his breathing as steady as he could manage to try and mask the fact that he’d woken up.

“If you really did go to the afterlife, big bro, why did you have to see him? Why not our parents?”

“Why didn’t you go back and stop yourself from this? Why does this hurt you so bad, but you never seem to want to change it?” If he could have gone back in time and stopped everything from happening, he’d do it in a heartbeat. He tried, in Noa’s virtual world, without a second thought.

When he saw the plana, knew of his brother’s interdimensional technology, that had been Mokuba’s first instinct again. While Seto was trying to go into God only knows where… dimensions or the afterlife or the past… Mokuba’s first thought was that he could go back and stop it. Stop their innocence from flowing into that pain. Save their dad. Stop the adoption. Compel their relatives toward a path or responsibility. Anything.

It was odd that Seto didn’t try to change the past.

Even though everything he did was connected to it, even though everything in their lives could be traced so neatly from the distinct awful events, he didn’t seem to want to go back. 

Mokuba looked at his brother’s form. “You don’t regret any of this. All we went through, you did win so much of it. And you wouldn’t take away your own pain. Does this really fulfill you? Is this what you want? 

“You used to say you would change the future, but you’re trying to duck out now. What do you need to want to live past this?”

Seto fluttered his eyes open slowly, and Mokuba ended his pleadings. He reacted as if he hadn’t said anything.

. . .

One they’d settled back into the house in the Marina, Seto took control of his work laptop and Mokuba admitted a sort of defeat: he accepted that the laptop was going to be glued to his recovering brother.

So Mokuba proved that his brother didn’t have the monopoly on rage, and stabbed the router with a fork. 

It had been part of a sort of silly minimalist set that the interior designer had picked out, and the utensil was made from bulky metal. It took a few jabs to break through the soft plastic of the casing, and with the final thrust he was able to trash at least part of the board. Unsure if it had really worked, he carded through his brother’s drawers and tools until he found a high-powered magnet. Mokuba slowly traced the magnet over the board, hoping that would be enough. Finally, taking out the last of his anger on the little box, he plugged the sink and filled it with water. He placed the defeated box in there. Seto could fish it out when he was ready.

Mokuba felt like a kid again, though he’d never gone through a phase of destroying his brother’s things, the way so many other kids had. He hadn’t had the luxury of harmless sabotage. He had been trusted, the loyal second in command, the first officer, the vice president. 

Trashing one of his brother’s toys did feel a little therapeutic, but it also felt like a symbol of their shifting relationship. Guardian, protector, person in charge of maintaining wellness in the house. Sibling upkeep. It felt like when Seto forced him to go to the mall to get new clothes when he was outgrowing his old ones. Like he could see something his brother couldn’t.

Seto had a mobile hotspot hidden elsewhere in the house, but without WiFi his remote desktop connection was a lot slower, limited to what the 3G device could provide. Mokuba had hoped that would be enough to deter him. And while it probably wasn’t quite enough to keep the elder Kaiba entirely offline, the unending frustration would force him to take occasional breaks.

“I never wanted you to be normal, before. Really. I wanted things to be different, easier and better, but this had got to change.”

“Cause the nights don't last and we leave alone. Will you drive me back? Can you take me home?”

\- “Brother” by Gerard Way

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YES I looked up how many people were using twitter in 2010. This is a weird, moody project. The next four chapters are half-written, and then this thing can finally die. Thinking I might upload them all in one day so that this stops rising to the top of the pairing tag.


	11. Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joey arrives and contemplates his position.

“And as it opened I could hear you howling from your room, but I hid out in the hall until the hurricane blew. When I reappeared I tried to give you something for the pain. You came to hating me again and just sang your refrain.”

\- “Two” by The Antlers

Joey wandered in with his backpack to see Seto curled on the couch, passed out with a puddle of router guts laying over his stomach, the fork still lodged into the casing of the machine. He was sleeping soundly, which was an unfamiliar sight for Joey, with those slim plastic-wrapped wires laced over his fingers like loose yarn in the hands of a knitter.

He looked connected to the machine, like they were Seto’s own wires spilling out, slipping out of his skin as if he was a broken robot.

Joey was pretty sure that the whole thing was fully busted. Although Mokuba wasn’t quite the prodigy his brother was, he could certainly fuck up a circuit board with the best of them. 

Joey reached out one hand to card through Seto’s soft hair, and when he didn’t stir, Joey caressed his cheekbone with the pad of his thumb. It was smooth, and mostly absent of the little lines that were spilling through the webbing of Seto’s undereye circles. They were all getting older.

He thought he really should let the other man know he was here, he couldn’t help but enjoy the moments of peace and silence that he could steal with his boyfriend? Partner? Ward? Ex?

It was troubling for Joey to be watching Seto slowly destroying his own life with the force and focus that were the hallmark of that classic Seto determination. 

Sometimes it felt like the whole world lived in the wake of Kaiba… sometimes it felt like the entire planet was in the audience of the Kaiba Dome staring up at fifteen projections of his face, quaking in holographic smoke. 

But passed out on the couch in the decaying light from those short January days, defeated by a router and his own human life force… strangely, though the sleeping figure looked much less like the monolith that Joey was so familiar with from the stage and, well, the man on the couch looked strikingly like someone Joey used to date.

The contrast between the person that Seto seemed to think we was and the person who Joey knew was somewhat disturbing. Seto seemed to think he was consistently acting in his rational self-interest, for the benefit of himself, his company, his brother. Those moments of lucid insanity—standing in a holographic Roman theater, cackling—somehow were invisible to Seto, even as they crackled across his own face.

Joey had never seen him as an unemotional man. Mostly because in his teen years he was so frequently stuck responding to the sheer power of the wrath of Seto’s suppressed emotions. Like the longer they were suppressed, the pressure chamber of Seto’s mind condensed them. From graphite to hardened diamonds, Seto’s emotions crystalized into their most devastating forms. The longer he held onto these feelings, the more they were international fucking problems. 

He left Seto’s unconscious body and his loose wiring – the inside of the router as exposed as the inside of Seto himself. Stabbed with a metal fork and short circuiting, spitting up wires and leaking radiation. Poisoning everyone around him, made all the more dangerous in his own decay. 

The chaos within Seto created an empire of holograms and eventually had spilled out from the planet into outer space and scattered across time and dimensions. Now, like a star gone supernova, all of that heat and light were collapsing inward. Forming in the wake of the cosmic event was that ultimate destructive force—a black hole. 

A black hole, destroying all light within a lightyear radius and certainly devouring any light that had been within him to begin with.

A black hole, passed out on the comfy living room couch.

Seeing Seto beat up and unconscious brought Joey back to their early days. Even before they’d shared a bed, he’d seen Seto unconscious more than most people, usually lying on the floor of some ancient ruins after a duel or ordeal. 

Fairly soon after he had returned from his interdimensional adventures, the years of stolen glances and mixed signals melted into something tangible, and Seto really, really went for the kill. Seto was not a man who could do anything in a measured way, that their tryst was exactly the same: magnetic, as vibrant as Joey’s nightmares, and just as haunting in his daylight hours. 

He remembered the iron taste of Seto’s blood in his mouth after an especially punishing kiss, the hard grind of his own back against concrete walls in alleys or the impact of the shelves against his vertebrae in Seto’s study. He remembered the way that he would find the strangest bruises in the strangest places for weeks afterwards. He could carbon date Seto’s calendar by the color of the mottled spots on his skin—the green patches meant he’d been at a tournament the last weekend, the blue ones showed that Seto had had time off a few days ago—or had made the time. 

That live wire was as dangerous and as electrified as always, tempting Joey with grandeur and danger.

He remembered the first time they went out to anything as a couple. They hadn’t even had a talk about whether or not they were proper boyfriends – or even friends. Kaiba was so good at liminal spaces, and their relationship hung in the hollows between reality and a game. Everything about their relationship felt like an extended game of “chicken,” waiting to see who would break first. Admit defeat, respect, affection.

Kaiba had announced that he was required to go to a movie premiere, since he had loaned certain space station resources to the blockbuster film. He’d been treated like Seto’s jock boyfriend, a successful duelist and attractive individual. It was so cool to exist in a world that knew nothing of his past. And in these encounters, it didn’t even matter who his friends were. 

That was soon unfortunately replaced with the experience of everyone caring very much about the state of his relationship with Seto Kaiba. And when it was not necessarily going well, that fact was very hard to hide. Inevitably things would become mired in complications and shame. The only analgesic in the whole situation was when they were together. Physically, it was like magnets were imbedded in their chests. With unseen forces, they were drawn together with such consistency and fierceness nothing could stop it.

Except, apparently, Seto himself.

Joey was trying to be quiet as he unpacked his backpack, but he realized that he had failed when he heard that family gravelly voice rise. “Great. You’re here,” Seto choked out.

“I fly how far ta help _your_ brother out, and that’s the best ya can do?” Joey said, signature smile plastered on. He looked as if he had climbed out of a promotional photo—hair lively, face clean and shiny, and eyes completely flat.

“Y’know what woulda been a better greeting?” Joey pushed his smile even further, biting into his cheeks.

“What.” Kaiba didn’t deign to make it a question.

“Happy Birthday!”

Kaiba groaned.

“There's two people living in one small room

Two people talking inside your brain

Two people believing that I'm the one to blame

Two different voices coming out of your mouth

While I'm too cold to care and too sick to shout”

\- “Two” by The Antlers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you thought the plot would move forward! I did too.  
> Ha! No dice. 
> 
> Comfort to come, next chapter! I promise.
> 
> Jou and I are both Aquarius! His birthday is January 25th!


	12. Painkiller

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Interventionshipping (Kaiba/Therapy)  
> Ruminations over ownership of Kaiba Corp.   
> You wanna see the phrase "preferred stock" in fanfiction? Here you go!

“Every conversation puts me back on medication…”

\- “Painkiller,” by Beach Bunny

Kaiba was the best at anything he set his mind to. It was a matter of pride as much as a personal policy. If it mattered—really mattered—he could warp the fabric of space and time. 

And today, he set his mind to moping. Full out moping, complete with the fixings: depressed silence, cold and dismissive noises in response to any statement levied at him, and the sort of lethargy so pathetic it was worthy of being a sin.

Sure as anything, Joey had found his way to a guest room. Kaiba had endeavored to entirely ignore his presence. It was like the house was possessed with an affectionate ghost. In response, Kaiba stubbornly glued his ass to the living room couch. As long as his fingers were poised on the laptop keyboard he could pretend to work when the blond specter floated through the room where the brunet was bitterly convalescing.

But Kaiba couldn’t work. He wanted to, so badly that it ached in his chest. But the cursed 3G signal was not enough for the remote desktop to handle any large files, and the router had remained beyond repair. His will was crushed by some internal force beyond his ability to perceive. 

It was nonsensical to Kaiba—he had been able to work under endless oppressive conditions. Long hours, punishment, torment, hate… on sleepy afternoons like this one, those awful days of his life were compressed in his memory. They took up little accessible space and blurred into one simple notion of a “bad time.” Sometimes those memories would strike up, exploding from their home and sting at his consciousness. He was ashamed that, lacking outside challenges in the way he once did, they burned him more frequently than they used to.

He stared out the bay window, watching the joggers in their Sketchers and the tourists with their cameras wander through the fog. 

He wondered if that very problem implied the solution. Did he just need to put more in jeopardy? Have a real, external enemy again? An exciting one, not just the unending monotonous enemies of time and product launches and stock prices.

A hungover tech bro puked into a garbage can along the Embarcadero, maybe fifty feet from his window. His forest green Patagonia vest was in the splash zone.

Kaiba could always sell his shares off. Or increase the market cap. He had preferred stock, and a myriad of lawyers from both America and Japan had assured him that his shares couldn’t be diluted unless he wanted them to be. Perhaps that’s what he needed to do—put Kaiba Corp. at risk for a hostile takeover. Maybe that would stoke the flames that had gone out, the ambition that he sought after.

The bro stumbled off again, heading back to his own Marina abode after a rough weekend.

But who would even have the vision to pick up on his clues? Industrial Illusions had been acquired in Fiscal Year 2008, a gambit made that much easier by the recession. Schroder Corp. had continued with holography, but had moved away from the gaming space in shame. Kaiba sighed at how painfully boring it would be to have Google absorb Kaiba Corp. Eric Schmidt was _fine_ , but hardly a thrilling rival. 

The bro was fully out of sight. Some road bikers streamed by, dressed entirely in their spandex suits, leaning over the handlebars with those little gloves.

Not for the first time, Kaiba considered sinking the company. A final and cruel “Fuck You” to Gozaburo and a final pronouncement that it was him, _Seto Kaiba_ , who determined the fate of the company.

But the complication was that it would never really be about _him_ , because the corporate world didn’t work that way.

Just as the publication of his relationship hadn’t hurt his profit margins after the next product release, Kaiba Corp. was simultaneously a one-man operation and a multi-national conglomerate. One who’s market share would be absorbed instantly by greedy competitors and remaining resources would be syphoned in any bankruptcy proceedings.

No, it wouldn’t be about personal glory if he downed the company in a blaze of flames. It wouldn’t be a testament to his misery or a commentary on his shame—nor proof that he had risen above the corporate world. It would be only proof of what anyone who dealt with him long enough knew—the only man who could fully crush Seto Kaiba was himself.

And, Kaiba noticed the ache in his bones as he shifted on the couch, he was doing a damn good job of that too.

True, lasting hunger is like that, he thought. It’s savage and seeping. Missing a meal makes your stomach hurt. Weeks turning to months of letting yourself decay makes for a new kind of pain. It dwells so deep in your body that it becomes part of you. Without hunger of one sort or another, who was he? Who could he be?

He was interrupted from his morose rumination.

“Ya know what this is?” Joey held out a plate. Two pieces of toasted white bread with a bright orange piece of cheddar cheese poking out from the four corners.

“This is a grilled cheese. It is a popular American lunch for children.”

“Yep. You gonna eat it?”

“Is that a real question?” Seto looked at the offending cheese sandwich.

“Yeah. You’re supposed to eat something. You wanna tell me what you want instead? Or are ya gonna eat this? Those are yer options.”

Kaiba held out a hand, accepting the plate. Joey whipped out his phone “For Mokuba,” he explained.

Kaiba didn’t preen, necessarily, but he did a little bit of a pose, and rolled his eyes long enough to show off that he wasn’t enjoying this.

“Kaiba, put it in yer mouth,” Joey said, before grinning wolfishly at his own double entendre.

Kaiba’s eye roll had already been maxed out, so he was left huffing to himself.

“For me?” Joey winked. 

Kaiba never could understand how the man seemed immune to his icy moods. It was like his bitterness and coldness never even happened. Everything just bounced off of Joey, and instead another sex joke or warm smile would beam out. 

Kaiba found it hard to keep his nasty grimace on his face with a mouthful of grilled cheese. The bread was crispy and buttery, and the cheese was gooey. It wasn’t bad, but it was heavy in his hands and on his tongue.

“There we go! Alright, and the next order of business is…” Joey smiled that poster board smile, trying to get early buy in. The grilled cheese wasn’t a medication—it was a marketing tactic.

“Don’t say it.” 

“Therapy. You agree to get help, and I’ll stay. If I’m staying and you’re getting help, I think Mokuba will agree to stay in school,” Joey glowed, as if he was unaware of how utterly unwelcome his suggestion was.

You never lead with your best bargaining position in a negotiation, Kaiba thought. You don’t show your whole hand, reveal your trump card moment one. But rules held little sway for Joey, and his opinions even less so. Tactics, outside of Duel Monsters, were mostly foreign to the man. How could anyone who had known him for _so long_ assume that he would give into such a god-awful demand due to a… cheese sandwich?!

Kaiba felt that familiar rage boiling in his chest. This, he could work with. He could spit out the grilled cheese, throw the plate, have a whole fit. 

But the intricacies of his cage remained. The threat that Mokuba would quit school. The reality that he would have to be alive enough to control the company. The knowledge, buried somewhere deep in there, that he did want to be loved, by Joey, again.

“Whatever it takes,” Kaiba settled on.

Joey reached down and smoothed Kaiba’s hair. He smiled warmly, and it made Kaiba feel a little bit dumb. And the pang in his gut, at the backs of his eyes, it could have been that it made him sad too. 

With a grumpy roll to face the cushions of the couch, Kaiba huffed, “and that’s your birthday present too.” 

“Take me to the hospital.

I need Paracetamol,

Tramadol, Ketamine.

I just need some pain relief.”

\- “Painkiller,” by Beach Bunny

**Author's Note:**

> / Hi! This is my first fanfic since I was about 13, and now I’m 25! I’ve been superimposing my feelings on the character of Seto Kaiba for about 11 years now, and I hope you will all pardon my ruthless corruption of the innocent(-ish) show Yu-Gi-Oh Duel Monsters for my selfish ends. I am trying to overcome alexithyma, and writing about characters who struggle fundamentally with self-knowledge, self-esteem, and self-destruction feels good.  
> The way I see the timeline is—Seto was 16 in 2001 in Season 1 of YGO:DM. So he’s 25 in 2010.  
> Y’all would you hate me if Mark Zuckerberg showed up? haha  
> Here are some links to help anyone else who may be struggling with C-PTSD, alexithymia, or childhood trauma.  
> https://www.healthline.com/health/cptsd  
> https://www.healthline.com/health/autism/alexithymia  
> https://www.blueknot.org.au/Survivors/Support/Resources-for-Survivors
> 
> The chapters all begin with quotes from songs. In this case, the full song really does have application to the story (and I think, to Seto). It’s also a very good song.


End file.
